


Trustworthy??

by TheBookOfPhini



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Angst, Blood Kink, Canon Compliant, Canon Divergence, Character Death, F/M, M/M, Monokuma is stressed out, Pre-Game Memories, Self-Harm, Spoilers, Suicidal Thoughts, Violence, alternative ending, and of course it's Kokichi's fault, or something like that, relationships are background, split personality, until Chapter 4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-13
Updated: 2018-10-16
Packaged: 2019-05-21 23:21:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 58,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14924784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBookOfPhini/pseuds/TheBookOfPhini
Summary: Kokichi finds a way to wrap the whole academy in darkness, destroying the fourth motive for the second time and making Monokuma in need of a new one.Looking back everything went downhill from there on.





	1. Blackout

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I had a new idea for a short story ;) 
> 
> Have fun while reading and I hope you enjoy it!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kaito looked ready to punch Kokichi for annoying Kiibo, while Monokuma looked ready to murder both Kiibo and Kokichi for damaging the power system and water supply. Luckily every one of them stayed alive...for now.

“Ouma-kun! Please stop running away and give it back!” Kiibo’s voice followed the fleeing Kokichi, clearly strained with distress. The robot had chased him by now through the whole courtyard, desperate to get his gift back. “Iruma-san gave this to me!”

Nothing new here. Kokichi already knew where the mascot whale had come from. He had seen them earlier in the hallway, Miu giving the killer whale to the robot for spending time with her.

At first he had been following the blond investor around the academy, because of her strange behavior over the last few days. It all started when they found a big computer with a simulation program on it, both things immediately captivating Miu’s attention. During the last few days she only left the room to eat something or go to her dorm room to sleep.

It was painfully obvious, at least to him, that Miu was planning something, probably messing with the programming code, but what for? That was something he still needed to find out and the exact reason why he was following her for the most time.

Today, when he was observing the blond girl again, he found Kiibo halfway down to her lab. He was cuddling with the killer whale or helping yacchi, as it was called in the MonoMonoMachine. A bit frustrated since he hadn’t found a new hint about Miu’s plans at all, he decided to tease the robot as a form of stress relief.

Being too fast for the poor robot he snatched the whale out of his arms and started to run down the hallway, laughing at the angry shouts from Kiibo.

“You need to be faster to catch me, Kii-boy!” Kokichi shouted back, still laughing. “If you really want your little toy back, you need to put more effort in your actions! Stop running like an old man! It’s like I’m being chased by a turtle! You’re prowling behind me like some clumsy stone golem... Oh wait! Nishishi~, that’s probably because you are overweight!”

“Argh!” Kiibo’s mood was dropping more and more for every second that passed. 

They had reached the backyard of the academy during their chase. Kokichi decided to hide from the robot in the near building, which held the boiler of the heating and sanitary system. Due to his head start he had enough time to search for a satisfying hideout, where Kiibo wouldn’t find him. He chose a place behind a bunch of crossing pipes, the killer whale dropped to his feet. Then he waited until the door finally opened to let a weary looking robot in.

“I’m tired of your game Ouma-kun! Please just give me back what belongs to me!” Kiibo said looking around for a hint where Kokichi could be hiding.

He didn’t react to this and stayed hidden, a smile appearing on his face. Kiibo was far too easy to tease.

“Please. Just...just lay it down and go. I’m tired of your antics.”

Kokichi grinned, but still showed no desire to come out of his hideout. The killer whale was still placed at his feet as he watched the robot searching the whole area until stopping in front of the door across from the one they had come in. He was probably coming to the conclusion that Kokichi could already have left through this door, being now who knows where at the academy. He heard him sighing deeply.

Kokichi took that as a sign to jump out of his hideout directly in front of the robot, startling poor Kiibo and causing him to stumble backwards. This could have been the end of it since Kokichi decided the game had become boring and that he would leave the killer whale there on the ground for Kiibo to find and flee before the robot could make another move.

At least that was his plan until Kiibo tripped over the cover of the manhole, which Gonta had thrown there on their first day, and hit one of the pipes. Despite still having hope it wouldn’t end in absolute chaos, the pipe cracked and broke, water gushing at high-speed out of it. They had broken the main water supply for the academy.

He flinched when the water jet hit a control panel installed on the wall, adding orange sparks and an unhealthy crackle to the mess. _Well that escalated fast,_ was his last thought before everything went dark and the former mechanical sounds of the boiler died down. Oh, _oh_.

They had caused a blackout.

Well Kiibo caused it with slight help from himself.

 

* * *

 

Shuichi was sitting in his lab, checking over the crime files he had found when suddenly everything went black, leaving only the fireplace in front of him to spent some dim orange light.

Irritation evidently shown on his face he decided to put the file, he had been reading, back in one of the shelves and check the outside. Maybe the blackout only happened in his lab? But upon opening the door he was proven otherwise. The hallway was also completely dark and empty. Without the light of the fire he couldn’t even see his hands in front of him. _Was this some new trick from Monokuma to disturb them?_ If it was he had to admit it was working. The darkness caused an uneasy feeling in his stomach.

The blackout must have affected the whole area. Despite it being only afternoon, there was no light coming through the windows, which could only mean the system simulating a change between day and night had also shut down. He grabbed his Monopad and flicked it on to use the display light as a lamp, so he could at least see where he set his foot, while heading to the ground floor. _What had happened?_

As to answer his question the monitor next to him sprung to life showing the faces of the remaining two Monokubs. “Attention, attention!” Monotaro squeaked from the couch he was sitting on, Monophanie next to him. “This is an emergency announcement! The power supply of the academy had shut down! But don’t fret; pops is already working on it!” Monophanie was catching on from there: “The emergency power will start in 10 minutes, until then please gather all in the gym!”

Shuichi had no other choice as to head to the gym, exactly like the Monokubs had instructed. On his way down he met with Kaito and Maki at the exact moment the emergency power support finally started working, filling the hallways with a dim and flickering light. The light dyed everything in a dull green gleam. Nonetheless it was enough to finally be able to see again and make out his surroundings further away than one step.

“Bro, do you have any idea what happened?” asked Kaito, he didn’t look appeased with the flickering light.

“No,” he answered truthfully. “I was reading in my lab when suddenly the light went out. After that I checked if it only happened in my lab, but it seemed to affect the whole area and then the announcement played.”

Kaito was about to say something to him, when a sudden weight was added to Shuichi's back. It came so suddenly that he, completely unprepared as he was and therefore not able to hold his balance, fell to the ground hurting his knees in the process.

“Ouch!” Sitting on the ground he looked up to see a person, completely dressed in white, hovering over him.

“Nishishi...Saihara-chan it’s sooo dark! I didn’t see you standing there, wearing all black!”

“But that’s a lie,” the shorter boy went on, while Shuichi rose from his embarrassing position on the floor, rubbing his sore knees.

“That’s no reason to make me fall like that,” he said with a sullen voice.

“Ah! Saihara-chan is mad at me!” Kokichi cried. “But I need you to protect me! Imagine what creatures could hide in these shadows. Saihara-chan needs to stand in front of me if one of them decides to attack me!”

“I’ve nothing to say to that,” Shuichi noticed, while shaking his head. “I surely won’t be your living shield, Ouma-kun! And the only dangerous creatures around are Monokuma and the Monokubs with their Exisal’s.”

“He probably caused the whole blackout,” Kaito spoke up, “He or Iruma-san.”

“Waaaah!” It didn’t take more than a second for the crocodile tears to appear in Kokichi’s eyes. “Help me my beloved. Momota-chan is bullying me!”

“It definitely was him,” Maki approved.

“So mean!” Kokichi huffed, starring them down until...

“Well.” The tears vanished as fast as they had come. “Of course it was me! Who else could be able to wrap a whole academy in pitch-black darkness! But that’s a lie~. It was Kii-boy after all!”

Finally their group of four had made it to the gym. Upon entering the room they found out that they were the last ones to arrive. The moment they saw the black and white bear standing on the stage, they regretted coming at all.

To say the least Monokuma didn’t look pleased. His face was madly red and the claws on his left paw were stretched out towards them as a threat. “Which one of you fucking bastards destroyed the power system? Now we all run on emergency power until this is fixed.”

“Ah, man poor Kii-boy! Why did you do this?” Kokichi immediately shouted from his position next to Shuichi.

“That’s...that’s entirely your fault!” the robot shouted in panic of attracting Monokuma’s anger towards him.

“You were leading me there and I only hit the pipe because you scared me!” Kiibo tried to defend himself. “And only because of the water coming from the broken pipe the power system was damaged. That’s your fault Ouma-kun!”

“How pitiful,” Kokichi snored, “show some responsibility Kii-boy! That’s really low of you to want others to suffer for your mistakes!”

Kaito looked ready to punch Kokichi for annoying Kiibo, while Monokuma looked ready to murder both Kiibo and Kokichi for damaging the power system and water supply. Luckily every one of them stayed alive...for now.

At least he now knew what had happened. Seemed like Kaito was right from the beginning in suspecting Kokichi.

“Shut up you brats!” Monokuma shouted still looking rather angry. “I will think of an appropriate punishment for you two, but first I need to fix this mess! Go back to your rooms and don’t dare destroying anything else!” With that he vanished.

So they passed the rest of the day in the gleam of the disturbing light, not in the mood to do anything ambitious. For Shuichi this meant he was heading back to his lab finding out that the flickering light gave him no option to start reading again. He decided to go fetch something to eat instead and then go back to his dorm room, maybe sleeping an hour or two until Kaito would pick him up for their training session.

They didn’t hear anything new from Monokuma until breakfast the next morning. But the first message wasn’t brought to them by the bear rather through Miu. She stormed into the dining hall, having a red face from running, while simultaneously cursing.

“See what you did you fuckin’ shota!” she screamed stopping in front of Kokichi. “The blackout caused the Neo World Program to collapse, because it was running at this moment. Now I need time to fix it and I don’t have any idea how long this will take.”

This caused Monokuma to appear among them, his Monokubs in tow. “What do I hear here?”

“As if somebody even wanted to use that stupid program. Like we’ve no other problems!” Kokichi shouted back ignoring the bear. If Shuichi didn’t know any better he would have said the shorter boy sounded relieved at the breakdown of the program.

“Stop right there!” Monokuma shouted, looking ready to kill, the person in question probably Kokichi. “What did you say!? My sweet Neo World Program is damaged?”

“Yes, beca-,” Miu began to explain but Monokuma wasn’t willing to hear her out and instead started shouting.

“Argh!!! You students are the worst! I work my brain day and night to find amazing motives for you and what do I get for my hard working? Nothing but grief!”

“First, I brought you a key card that would finally _finally_ lead you to a flashback light which would grand you a glimpse of the outside world. Information you all longed for the whole time you’re here and what happened!? The purple gremlin grabbed the key card, used the flashback all alone and didn’t tell you a thing about it because he thinks it’s only a lie fabricated from me!”

The bear sighed and stopped, looking like he was trying to calm himself down. “But since I’m such a nice bear I thought, ‘ _Monokuma_ _let him be, just give them something else’_. So I guided you towards the unlimited possibilities of the Neo World Program. And hey, Iruma-san kept up fast! Until today she already had a nearly finished plan for a wonderful murder created in her mind!”

“Wait-,” the blond in question screamed, “What-!? Stop...stop it!”

But Monokuma was in a rage, shutting everything else out, especially the unbelieving noises all students in the dining hall made upon hearing Miu had planned a murder. Shuichi shivered. _Could she really have thought about a murder plan and why was Monokuma divulging it all now?_

“See, she totally messed with the programming code of the Neo World Program, so everyone dying in there would also die in the real world. Genius brain she is she also added a line to a specific avatar, which would later be Ouma-kun’s, ensuring he would be unable to move the moment she touched him in the game. This would make it totally easy for her to kill him then!”

“Eh!?” Kokichi looked at the bear bewildered, then to Miu, then again back to the bear. Nonetheless, observing Kokichi's actions and mimics, Shuichi concluded that he at least had suspected some of this.

Monokuma decided to ignore Kokichi’s interruption and went on: “Oh she had planned all of it in such a good detail! She deleted all the dangerous items and made the remaining ones unbreakable to weigh you all in safety, but secretly she purposefully ignored to remove a hammer, which she wanted to use as a murder weapon. To confuse everyone about how the killing happened, she also messed with the world’s map to bring further disorder. She then created a mobile phone that allowed her to log anyone out of the world at any given time, because she wanted to use this to frame the murder on Momota-kun.”

“What!?” He could hear nearly everyone shouting in the dining hall, desperately trying to proceed what Monokuma had told them.

The words: “That`s not true!” were finally shouted loud enough by Miu to overcome the voices of the other students. But one look into her face, which showed shame and guilt, told Shuichi that Monokuma hadn’t lied to them. At least not completely. _So Miu had been planning Kokichi’s death?_ He felt his body grew cold. _Why couldn’t this damn killing game stop? Why was there every time a person, who played along with Monokuma’s motives?_

His train of thoughts was interrupted from Monokuma, who obviously wasn’t finished with them after all. The bear breathed deeply and shot them murderous looks.

“How could you do this to me? Now the wonderful Neo World Program is damaged for I don’t know how long. But I won’t wait any longer for the next killing to happen so I decided that in my utter kindness I will present you a new motive!”

“So you fucking bastards, time for my last attempt to give you a sufficiently motive! This time there’s no way out! Listen carefully!”

“After 24 hours I will reveal one of your darkest memories of your past to another student!” he paused obviously wanting to hear their shocked gasps at this statement.

 _Their darkest memories? What does that even mean?_ Nothing Shuichi could think of from his past was worth being called a motive. So he hadn’t anything to fear at all, _right_?

But the malicious gleam in the bear’s eyes made him feel uneasy. Something about that motive didn’t sound right.

“Probably all of you are now thinking something along the line: ‘Oh but I didn’t do anything bad in my past!’” Monokuma started to laugh like a maniac, his voice resounding through the dining hall. “But believe me that’s only because none of you actually remembers these things. There are still hidden memories inside each one of you. Memories, if shared with the world, would maybe make someone want to kill you, kill you in an attempt to save everyone else of you bastards... You’re right when you’re thinking that there are still vicious sleeper between you that could be awaken when given the right memory...Ahahaha...”

Shuichi couldn’t believe what Monokuma was saying. Never could any of that be true, could it? This was nothing else then a new lie from the bear, a trick to get them back into killing...

“But I’m not an unfair bear! That’s why I will let you chose the student which will receive your memory! But choose wise, whom you **trust** with such a sensitive memory! We don’t want a mass killing to happen! Ah and one last remark: every student can only receive one memory, so no double choosing!”

“Also if you don’t choose anyone I will just reveal your memory to everyone!”


	2. Trust issues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "... There’s no chance we would forget such an important part of our own past and Monokuma just comes along and gives the memory back, not even to us, but someone else!”
> 
> His patience broke and Kokichi couldn’t hide his annoyance anymore. In times like these, when the stupidity of the astronaut outperformed all his expectations, it was hard to handle him. “So you mean it would be impossible to lose an important memory, like for example, what had happened to us before we woke up inside the academy?” 
> 
> (The last hours before the time limit expires - Kokichi's side)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, thank you so much for your comments and kudos so far!  
> I really hope the further chapters can fulfill your expectations!

After Monokuma and the last Monokubs had vanished, the remaining students were stunned into silence trying to understand what had happened moments ago. Monokuma had been in a rage over the blackout that he had completely overrun them with his words. Lies, murder plans and a new motive spilling out of his mouth like it was nothing. The resulting silence lasted until the spoken words finally settled inside their minds.

Meanwhile Kokichi was observing every expression displayed on the faces scattered alongside the big table. One face in particular caught his attention. Pressing his lips together he chose to show them a blank expression, patiently waiting for the others to start freaking out over Monokuma’s words.

“This...this is...horrible,” Tsumugi said in an attempt to break the awful silence. She looked about to start crying every minute now. 

“Gonta not understand. Gonta is Gentleman and Gentleman not doing bad things.” Poor Gonta, but still, even Kokichi couldn’t think how this innocent big guy could ever own a memory persuading someone to kill him. Considering Monokuma’s exact wording, it may be true that not all memories reach the ‘need to get rid of them’ state.

“Eh... That’s too much of a hassle to think about,” came from Himiko. Despite her carefree sounding words, she was trembling and looked ready to pass out rather sooner than later.

“That bear’s trying to fool us,” Kaito’s oh so hopeful and gullible voice sounded from across the table. “The memories he’s speaking of are probably some made up story. Some shit he invented about each of us too make us act the way he wants us to. There’s no chance we would forget such an important part of our own past and Monokuma just comes along and gives the memory back, not even to us, but someone else!”

His patience broke and Kokichi couldn’t hide his annoyance anymore. In times like these, when the stupidity of the astronaut outperformed all his expectations, it was hard to handle him. “So you mean it would be impossible to lose an important memory, like for example, what had happened to us before we woke up inside the academy?”

“Uh...” Needless to say Kaito was dumbstruck by his words just as Kokichi had expected.

“And hey!” he changed to a cheerful voice and bright smile. “No one’s going to address that the blond slut wanted me dead?”

Retrospective his deductions hadn’t been wrong considering the fact that he knew beforehand Miu was planning on doing something foul. It also hadn’t been farfetched to connect her actions to the situation they were in and accusing her on thinking of killing. What he hadn’t expected was that he should end as the victim of Miu’s plans. Maybe he would’ve had found out during one of his observations, but Monokuma simply anticipated Miu’s actions in disclose them to all students. For sure, it wasn’t a surprise after all. More interestingly Kokichi was now curios to see how the others would react to Miu’s betrayal.

“Ugh,” Miu made an unpleasant sound at his blunt words, obviously wishing she would be everywhere but here. She looked ready to run and hide, squirming under the stares directed to her.

“Oh come on!” Miu finally found her voice again. “All of you would be more than happy if the little shit was gone!”

“Can’t deny that.” No surprise for him that the assassin was on side with Miu. _Thanks Maki._

“No! No one should be hurt. Killing is bad! Gonta wants everyone to be happy!” Gonta exclaimed truly shocked by Miu’s words.

“Thanks Gonta,” Kokichi said meaning it, “At least one who doesn’t want me dead!”

“I don’t want you dead either.” Kokichi nearly jumped at the detective’s voice, since he had kept silent the most part of their conversation up until now. He couldn’t deny that it made him a bit happy to hear, that indeed, not everyone wanted him gone. “I want no one to suffer and die anymore... So why had you do this Iruma-san?”

“Hmph,” the blonde inventor growled, “What do you think why I wanted to do this? My genius brain is trapped inside this foul academy, while the world outside needs me! With everything happening out there they will be desperately in need of me and my inventions! It’s only natural to try to save the world with getting out of this hell!”

“Wait-,” Kaito said stumbling over his own words, “So...you not only wanted Ouma-kun dead but also sacrifice us all for you to get out?”

_Hey, one intelligence point for Kaito for figuring that one out!_

“Ugh,” Miu looked like she was about to break, but before anyone could say anything else to her, she sprung from her chair and fled the dining hall.

At least she was gone now, Kokichi couldn’t have stand seeing her face any longer. He would’ve probably left on his own by now, but he was too interested in the other's thoughts about Monokuma’s announcement.

“What do you think about these ‘memories’ Monokuma was speaking of?” Tsumugi guided the topic back to their main problem after the doors had closed behind Miu.

“That shit can’t possibly be true can it?” Kaito commented, still trying to find some comfort in their situation in labeling all of it as a lie. “I mean what we remembered up until now hadn’t any hint of us doing something evil.”

“That would be the case if everyone had told the truth about what they had seen through the flashback lights,” Maki decided to join the conversation.

Kokichi sighed deeply. Still they hadn’t understood anything at all. “Considering the flashback lights had shown us the truth,” he offered help for their thinking process.

“You mean the same reason while you obviously withhold one of them after using that key card?” Shuichi asked looking curios at him. So he had paid attention to what Monokuma had been telling them. “Why didn’t you told us? What did it show?”

“Pah!” Kokichi answered. “Nothing important! It just wanted to convince us that the outside world had become a dead place where no one can live anymore~!”

"What-!?"

“Do you have to say it in such a cheerful voice?” he was asked by Tsumugi.

“Yes!”

“So... You think all of that is a lie?” Shuichi picked up his last train of thoughts. “All we’ve seen so far?”

“Didn’t say that,” he couldn’t stop himself from saying. It wasn’t completely wrong, after all he had his suspects about the memories implanted by the flashback lights, but he also couldn’t tell if everything they had seen was a lie. At that point only Monokuma and the mastermind knew the full truth and if nothing else that was the best reason for doubting them.

He already had made up his mind that he wouldn’t trust any of the things the flashback lights showed them. He had also decided not to use any of them again. Maybe they were true or maybe not, but the fact Monokuma was the one giving the flashback lights to them was a red flag.

“Just tell us what you think then?” Kiibo asked with all the politeness he could muster after what had happened prior.

“Huh? Wouldn’t that make it too easy?” he looked innocent at the others. “It could help try thinking about it by yourself for once.” Even if they were in a menacing situation all of them should at least try to get their own brains working.

Like they clung on Shuichi’s deductions in every class trial so far and relying on him to find the truth, they now claimed the same from him. But if they didn’t find it out for themselves he certainly believed they would doubt his words by the next lie given to them.

“Just stop it with your antics!” shouted Kaito. “And tell us what you’re thinking.”

“Why don’t _you_ tell us what _you’re_ thinking?... Oh, probably because you can’t. I mean think...” Kokichi grinned, finally back in his malicious role.

“Do you want to die?” Maki’s standard answer, when she didn’t know what to say anymore, was directed at him. All he could do was laughing at her.

“Ouma-kun, can you...can you not, for once, tell us what you’re thinking?” Shuichi said sounding exhausted. He really considered for a second to give in, in favor of Shuichi, but decided against it. “Nope.” He then jumped from his chair to exit the dining hall. After making a spectacular departure, he headed straight back to his dorm room.

Kokichi had to admit he was curios on how Monokuma would try to convince them the memories they would receive were true, especially after the open mentioned doubts. The bear's, oh so loved, motive would go to waste if no one believed in what they had been showed. Surely Monokuma couldn’t really believe they would easily accept that people like Gonta or Shuichi could’ve ever done something worth being killed for!? Even if Monokuma created such a story there was no way anyone would just believe it like that. _Well almost no one..._

To avoid the mess Monokuma wanted to initiate Kokichi would need to keep a close eye on every one of them after tomorrow. He sighed. This motive really got him on edge, because of the uncertainty it caused. Maybe they were stressing too much about the whole thing, if all of it was nothing more than a made up story by Monokuma and therefore didn’t matter at all, but he shouldn't be too sure.

Still, he needed to think about who to ask for receiving his memory. Even if all of it was a lie, he had to make a decision before the end of the time limit. Trusting someone didn’t came easy for him, also there weren’t really much students he even considered worthy for one second. The best way to decide would be in assuming the worst Monokuma could come up with and found out who would handle it best.

Kokichi walked up and down in front of his whiteboard looking at the pictures and remarks he had put there. It wasn’t a surprise to whom he tended to chose. After all only one picture could be seen which was tagged with the question of being trustworthy, the one of his beloved detective.

But first, before he would accept it, the detective had to prove himself worthy of his trust. As a second option he could probably chose Gonta, because he didn’t think the big guy would understand it at all and would accept it easily as a lie from Monokuma if Kokichi told him so. Still it was risky, choosing Gonta could backfire if the big guy felt the need to protect the other students from him. Since he had no idea what the memory would be about, Shuichi was the safer and therefore his first choice.

He had to stay wary from now on. None of them could predict if someone wouldn’t take the memory too serious and act on it. Up until now Monokuma had succeeded every single time to got at least one person to snap after having given out one of his motives.

Thinking of his motive video about D.I.C.E he really couldn’t think of anything he could’ve done to make someone want him dead, not considering his usual behavior. A painful knot was forming in his stomach, _if the flashback lights are a lie..._ No he wouldn’t allow himself to think like that. Kokichi smothered the contaminating thoughts and lingered instead with the warm feeling the thought of his followers evoke in him.

Whilst figuring out what to do, he needed also to think of a way to end this stupid killing game once and for all. Maybe...maybe if it wouldn’t lead to a murder and if they were actual true memories, they may hold some kind of clue? Tapping with his fingers against the picture of Shuichi he made up his mind. The first step of his plan was finding the detective and forcing him to spend time with him, hoping he didn’t already agree on receiving someone else memory.

Though, probably half of the remaining students, or all of them, were already annoying his beloved detective in looking at their memory. How smart of Monokuma to make that last rule, otherwise Shuichi would’ve had to look onto 8 memories while only giving his to someone else. It was really foolish how much the others relied on the detective’s steadiness and conclusions. They didn’t even notice when he was lying to them during a trial, despite his beloved detective being one of the worst liars he had ever met.

After two hours of being trapped into his own thoughts, he decided it was time to search for Shuichi. He first went back to the dining hall, which proved to be empty by now. His next attempt was the detective’s lab, finding it also empty. _Where could he have gone?_

Kokichi decided to stroll around the courtyard when he saw someone in black clothes sitting on the bench next to the stairs leading down to the Shrine of Judgement.

“Hey Saihara-chan!” he shouted from his position at the entrance doors before hurrying over to the detective. Kokichi let himself fall down on the bench next to the other boy. “Thinking?”

“Hmm,” the detective hummed slowly, obviously still lost in his thoughts and paying no attention towards him. A fact, which Kokichi couldn’t accept. In order to get the attention he deserved he started to poke his fingers in the detectives soft side.

“Saihara-chan pay attention to me!”

The poor boy was startled by the sudden poking and jumped slightly. It only took him one more second to recognize the shorter boy sitting next to him on the bench and starring angrily at him.

“Ouma-kun!” he said surprised. “Since when are you here?”

“Half an hour,” he answered, showing Shuichi a serious expression, which was also emphasized by a cold voice.

“W-What-?”

“Aaand Saihara-chan was so mean, ignoring me the whole time! Now you need to make it up to me!” Kokichi had decided to play this game a bit longer wanting Shuichi to call him out on his lie.

“This can’t be true!” Shuichi answered. “I sure would have noticed if you were sitting such a long time next to me.”

“But you didn’t!” he screamed, quiet considering if he should use crocodile tears too to get his point across.

Finally he saw a glimpse of understanding in his beloved eyes. “That’s a lie... You would’ve never kept still for such a long time.”

“Nishishi, well...it may have been a lie then, maybe I only sat there for a minute before starting to poke you!”

“So...what do you want?” Shuichi asked.

“Can’t I just sit next to my beloved Saihara-chan and spent time with him?” Kokichi answered with an unmistakable undertone in his voice, causing the boy next to him to blush slightly.

“You want to spent time with me?”

“Yes! Let’s have some fun together and forgot about that stupid motive for now!”

“O-Okay fine,” Shuichi accepted. “What do you want to do? Hopefully nothing that involves _knives_.” Seemed like his detective still remembered their last free time spent together, in which Kokichi had cut himself while playing the ‘knife game’. This _definitely_ _hadn’t_ happened on purpose to make Shuichi take care of him and also _wasn't_ a revenge on Shuichi for the time he had ignored Kokichi after falling through the floor and hitting his head. He still had a scar from that one on his head, but luckily it turned out to be nothing too bad, only a bearable laceration. _Stupid Korekiyo._

“What do you want to do?” Kokichi replied instead.

“Huh? Me?” Shuichi looked confused over to him. He looked like he had expected him to take control and drag him somewhere.

“Yes you! Because I’ve decided where we went every time when you asked me out. Now I've asked you and this means it’s your turn to decide! Let’s have some fun together.”  

“Then maybe the library?” Shuichi suggested.

Kokichi kept his face blank, while his mind was screaming: ‘boooring!’ and tried to convince him to lead Shuichi somewhere else. Still he chose not to say anything. He had told the taller boy he was free to choose and Kokichi would go with it. After all his suggestions beforehand would’ve been either the detective’s lab or the library, it turned out to be the ladder.

“Fine let’s go!” he jumped up from the bench having changed to his cheerful smile and simultaneously grabbed Shuichi’s wrist to drag him with him. Since he already knew Shuichi was way too nice, the detective stumbled without complaining after the leader through the hallways. Kokichi only let go of him when they reached the door to the library.

“So what do you want to do now between all those dusty and old smelling books?” he said cheerfully.

“If you didn’t like where we would go, why hadn’t you say something?” Shuichi asked, slight hurt shown in his eyes.

“No...oh! Saihara-chan got it all wrong!” Kokichi immediately retreated. By no means would he let Shuichi think he didn’t want to be here with him. “As long as I’m with you every place is fine~!”

“Ouma-kun...” Shuichi said while rolling his eyes. “Just...” He seemed to think over what he wanted to say at all and ended up forming a new sentence: “Just come in! I have an idea.”

Kokichi needed a second to cover his surprise about the demanding words, spoken from Shuichi’s mouth, with a smiling face. “Watcha planning Saihara-chan?”

Inside the library Shuichi _ordered!?_ him to sit down next to a stack of books where some pillows were placed on the floor. Still irritated, but also in the same time pretty curios, he just followed the other boy’s orders and sat down quietly. He noticed Shuichi going over to one of the bookcases, grabbing a stack of books from the shelf, before coming back and sitting down next to him. 

“Really all you want to do is reading?” Now he definitely regretted giving the detective the option to choose this time.

“Actually,” Shuichi started while chuckling slightly, a sound Kokichi didn’t often hear from the detective. ”I want to play a game of investigation with you. Did you ever read an interactive novel? It turned out there are a few here in the library.”

“Huh? An interactive novel?” He had a general idea about it, but he wouldn’t deny Shuichi the fun to explain it to him. After all, that sounded not as boring as he had thought this would end upon coming to the library.

“Ah,” Shuichi smiled, obviously getting more comfortable in his situation. “The story will be like a normal murder mystery, but every time a critical decision is needed we can decide which route the protagonist should take. Depending on our choices the story will proceed different. We’re responsible if the culprit can be captured or how much damage they’re able to cause along their way. Sometimes there are also riddles and you need to chose the right answer to them to proceed.”

“Aren’t these normally child’s books?” Kokichi remembered. “Where it’s pretty obvious from the beginning what’s going on?”

“Normally yes...but there are a few more difficult ones, like these I found here,” Shuichi said thoughtfully. “Though these two are really for kid’s,” he said holding the most colorful ones in his hands.

“Then let’s start with them!” Kokichi smiled “So you can have an easy start. I mean I don’t need it but I don’t want to stress you out with the first story...”

Reacting to his words Shuichi took one of the colorful books and opened it. That was when Kokichi decided to make him uncomfortable by starring intensively at the other boy and looking sulky.

“What-?” Shuichi asked not knowing what was going on with Kokichi.

“If you’re sitting that far away from me I can’t read any word at all! You need to come closer so we can look in the book together!”

Before Shuichi could react to his words, Kokichi decided to take action himself. Shoving himself over to Shuichi’s pillow he took his place in the other boys lap. He snatched the book out of Shuichi’s hands and opened it, so both of them had a good look at it. He couldn’t see the other boy but he was sure the detective was blushing madly by now.

A small victory for him was that Shuichi made no attempt to shove him off of his lap, instead he felt suddenly something soft touching his cheek. From the corner of his eye he could see Shuichi leaning over his shoulder to get a better view. He smiled at Shuichi’s insecurity about what to do with his arms until the detective decided to simply put them on his legs. After that Kokichi turned his attention towards the book.

While Shuichi was at first obviously restrained about their reading position, he regained his confidence back while they worked with the book. Like he had predicted it was rather easy to find the right answers and to no one’s surprise they reached the best end in no time. Still he couldn’t deny it was funny. It got even better when they turned to the real and more challenging books.

This time they had to pay definitely more attention to the story to not miss the important hints. While both of them had nearly no problem in finding the right clues they still fought sometimes over the answer they wanted to proceed with. Mostly because Shuichi liked to take the submissive and thinking ways, while Kokichi preferred the more direct and aggressive decisions to lure out the culprit.

After a longer fight Shuichi stated if Kokichi was behaving stubborn like this he should try one story alone. Well he really wanted to show Shuichi his flawless intelligence and so he accepted without hesitation. It ended, well, not exactly like he had hoped for. To first mention the best part of it, Kokichi was able to get enough clues the police later could use to expose the culprit. For second remark he also got himself killed by the hands of the culprit while being too aggressive in wanting to track them down alone.

“So can I conclude that you get yourself killed easily when left alone?” Shuichi grinned, enjoying this way too much for Kokichi’s liking.

“That’s totally cheating there!” Kokichi complained. “This happened only because the detective in the story is so dopey. I would’ve never let me spotted easily like that! And being crushed under a chandelier... _Please_ , how can someone die like that? Why didn’t they simply shoot him!?”

When he couldn’t stand Shuichi’s gleeful smile anymore he decided it was enough for today. Also he already had made up his mind. “I’m getting hungry! Maybe we should head to the dining hall and eat dinner! You don’t want me to starve, do you?” Without waiting for a response Kokichi stood up and walked with Shuichi in tow in the direction of the dining hall.

“That reminds me...” Shuichi began slowly. “After you left in the morning we decided we would make our decision about whom to give our memory during dinner... Do you already know who you want to give your memory to?”

“Man, I said I didn’t want to speak about the memories during our free time! But since you mentioned it and ruined the atmosphere already-!” Kokichi said.

Kokichi decided that now would be the best time, and probably last time, to tell Shuichi that he was going to trust him with his memory. Still he was a bit surprised when the detective immediately agreed and also asked in return if Kokichi would be willing to accept his memory.

Upon opening the doors of the dining hall, they were greeted with an already ongoing discussion. Kokichi only needed one second to find out what it was about. The same topic they had discussed in the morning and the one to which even he hadn’t found an answer yet. _How would Monokuma convince them the memories were true?_

When they were taking their seats, Shuichi next to Kaito and Kokichi next to him, the last two students missing entered the room. Namely Himiko and Tsumugi. As on cue the loud voices suddenly died down, due to the sound of an appearing Monokuma.

“So you bastards still aren’t satisfied?” Monokuma barked. “What is it now?”

“Why should we believe the memories you will force us to watch will be real?” Maki asked loosing no time with unnecessary words, while bringing up the topic they had discussed before the bear had appeared.

Looking like finally going insane Monokuma told them: “Oh fine! So what if we made a new rule addiction then? Like, if the memories aren’t showing the truth everyone is free to leave and the killing game is at his end? Would that be convincing enough for you?”

“Why not including also the flashback lights in your rule?” Kokichi couldn’t miss to announce.

“...”

_Ah, finally..._ Judging from Monokuma’s reaction the flashback lights held indeed some lie. But were they completely made up or were they real memories but edited? No matter what, they couldn’t take them in count anymore. As if he ever would’ve done that. Still it was also painfully obvious the others had, some of them trusting every little thing the flashback lights had told them.

Maybe he should explain his deduction to them again later. He was pretty sure Kaito hadn’t understood what Monokuma had revealed to them by not choosing to answer to his remark. Also he could leave this one to Shuichi, not wanting to risk getting punched by Kaito or strangled by Maki.

Kokichi grabbed at the edge of the table thinking what the added rule would also mean for them. Independently from what they might saw Monokuma had now made it a truth by adding it as a binding rule. He felt nauseous. To trust someone with an obvious lie about him was one thing, but trusting someone with a truth about him was on a completely other level. _A truth he didn't remember._

Taking a turn and dropping the topic Monokuma shouted: “I will see you again tomorrow after looking at how lovely your friends really are. Hopefully the power system will be repaired by then, I’m sick of this emergency light. And of course all of you will only be allowed to leave your room after watching the video!”

“Ah that reminds me, did you peasants made up your mind about who will receive whose memory? Just telling now would make things easier for me,” Monokuma told them.

“Y-Yes we have decided,” Tsumugi stuttered.

“Tell me, tell me!” the bear ordered.

“So we decided that Harukawa-san and Momota-kun will watch each other’s memories, Yumeno-san will watch Shirogane-san’s, while hers is being watched by Gokuhara-kun,” Kiibo started to explain. “Also Shirogane-san will watch mine, while I watch Iruma-san’s. Gokuhara-kun’s will be watched by Iruma-san and at last Ouma-kun and Saihara-kun will watch each other’s.”

For a moment he thought Monokuma looked a bit surprised, but he made no further comment on their pairings. Simply nodding at Kiibo’s enumeration, the bear left them alone with the words: “Sweet dreams bastards! This will be the last time!”

Monokuma came back for a second glaring at them, mostly at Kokichi. “Ah one last thing: all announcements are cancelled because the monitors won’t work until we have back our main power system.”

 

* * *

 

Back in his dorm room Kokichi still starred at the words now shining against him from the display of his Monopad: ‘ _The memories given to the students tomorrow (XX.XX.XXXX) need to be true memories of their past, otherwise all students are allowed to leave if they want_ _and the killing game will end’._

Well, they were screwed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Definitely not* a Chapter 5 reference in here ;)


	3. Future prospects

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The moment Shuichi opened the door he had made the poor girl jump, her Monopad slipping out of her fingers and falling to the ground. It made a dull sound when it hit the floor.
> 
> “Ah, I’m so sorry I didn’t mean to startle you that bad!” he said grabbing for the Monopad and giving it back to its rightful owner without another look. Luckily it wasn’t broken. 
> 
> (The last hours before the time limit expires - Shuichi's side)

After Kokichi exited the dining hall in his usual mannerism the discussion only got worse. As if it hadn’t been already gone insane considering the students had to process all the things Monokuma spitted out to them like it was nothing.

“Is it really okay that precisely _those_ two are gone now, while we’re here discussing things?” Tsumugi looked afraid like she feared something could happen leaving Miu and Kokichi out there alone.

“Ouma-kun will probably avoid Iruma-san after what Monokuma told us, while Iruma-san will hide herself from us. I don’t think we need to worry about them right now. It would be stupid of her to act right after her...murder plans had been disclosed,” Shuichi concluded, still he couldn’t completely shake off the uneasy feeling he had. It would probably be for the best if someone would keep a close eye on both of them.

“I can go and look after Iruma-san.” Sensing the insecurity Kiibo offered to help to lower the tension. “I know she planned horrible things but I think I’m able to handle her and also keep an eye on her.”

“That sounds like a good idea,” Kaito reassured him. “And the little gremlin will probably hide like he always does. We shouldn’t be worried about him.”

“I’m not entirely sure we can just plain ignore him,” Tsumugi said in a thinking manner, “Because we have one more problem and it involves both of them. Considering our actual built-up tension, finding all pairings won’t be easy.”

“You’re right Shirogane-san...” Maki agreed with her.

“Ah, thank you!” Giving the flustered Tsumugi a short glance Maki continued: “We will need someone trusting Ouma-kun and Iruma-san with their memory.”

“Similarly it won’t be easy for Ouma-kun too, to choose someone whom he will trust with his memory,” Shuichi remarked.

He had expected that he would be greeted with some comments on how they should focus more on their comfort than the other two’s, while thinking about possible pairings. What he hadn’t expected was that after he finished his sentence every single one in the dining hall was staring at him. 

Maki was the first one to break the unpleasant silence: “You.”

“What?” he looked at her confused, since this wasn’t quite a detailed explanation.

“Maki Roll’s right, I think of us all he likes you the most,” Kaito supported Maki's statement, earning himself a disapproving look due to the use of his unique nickname he had given the assassin, “He will probably choose you.”

“But-,” Shuichi tried to speak up against the arguments of his friends.

“Definitive you,” Kiibo joined in.

When even Himiko told him her approval Shuichi gave in: “Hm...” He stayed silent thinking for a short time before he continued: “Considering your right and he really chose me to receive his memory...then maybe it would be for the best if...if I would give mine to him in return?”

“I mean we already discussed the problems of someone willing to give his memory to one of those two.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Of course Maki wouldn’t be fond of the idea. But who else was there to chose?

“We need someone to give his memory to him anyway, so to makes things easy I will do it,” Shuichi said more confident now. He felt it was for the best, even if he didn’t know what awaited them.

“I think the rest of the pairings should be chosen over the day?” Kiibo suggested, “We can approach each other and ask and at dinner today we can tell everyone what we decided.” No one had anything against Kiibo’s suggestion, so they simply nodded their consent.

“There’s only the problem with Iruma-san then,” Kaito remembered them, “Who will trust her?”

“If this is problem! Gonta will help. Gonta give Iruma-san his memory even if Gonta didn’t understand what that means.”

Maki nodded. “This may be the best choice.”

“Gonta is happy to help!”

“I would change the memories to happy ones but due to this tiring place my MP won’t recover as fast as normal,” Himiko slowly spoke up, her head resigned on the table as if about to fall asleep.

“Not be sorry! Everyone does their best,” Gonta answered.

“Nyeh, I’m tired,” the mage yawned.

“Should Gonta bring you back to your room?”

Shuichi had to admit it looked rather adorable when Gonta easily picked up the short mage and placed her on his shoulders finally aiming for her room. As the doors closed behind them it was Shuichi who brought up the topic from before again.

“It’s probably for the best if we, for now, rethink everything thoroughly. Still Kaito is right, what if all memories are only made up stories from Monokuma?”

“I think we should act like they will be real ones,” Tsumugi said not confident in her own words. “I-I mean it’s just plain old mine opinion, but maybe it would be a good idea, after we looked at the memories, to met with the others and talk about it. Staying calm and speaking with the according person may prevent some hasty actions.”

“You’re right!” Kaito immediately shouted to underlay her assumptions. “After tomorrow morning we all need to gather together and talk about what happened. We won’t let us be tricked by that bear! We should believe in our friends! Whatever we may see discussing it will be the best way to go! Only like that are we able to prevent the same happenings after we received the motive videos.”

After Kaito’s insistently speech everyone gave their approval to their new found plan and finally finished breakfast in favor of spending time with the one’s they may want to give their memory to.

Since his fate was nearly set Shuichi hadn’t much motivation to go and waste someone else time, that was why he ended up in the courtyard sitting down on a bench next to the stairs. From this place he could see Kiibo heading towards Miu’s lab, where the inventor probably was, fulfilling what he had promised before.

Shuichi chose this place to give his mind the chance to calm down after all they had to process in the last few hours. His thoughts were trapped between the blackout, that a murder had been prevented because of it and Monokuma’s strange behavior. No matter how this new motive would turn out, something awful was about to happen.

In the end of the day he had to pick someone, not that he had much choice by now in who to pick...still Shuichi hated the decision they had to make. Finding someone to trust with a dreadful memory he couldn’t remember at all. What would the memories show them? Looking over the remaining students he really wasn’t sure what secrets they could possibly hold? _And what would his memory be like? What if Monokuma was simply making something up?_

For now all he could do was making his choice and finding out how much truth the memories hold after he had seen the one meant for him. Would Kokichi really trust him with his memory? And would the motive cause another death?

He closed his eyes... Kaede and Rantaro, Kirumi and Ryoma, Korekiyo, Angie and Tenko...wasn’t it already enough? He was so tired of losing another one of his friends again and again. Even worse to watch them die by the hands of another friend or Monokuma.

Why had they to go through all of this? How much more until they finally get the chance to leave? The regulations said the last two would win, two... _just two._ He was determined to save as many of his friends as he could attain, the only question was how? How would he do this, if he turned out to be only useful when another one of their friends had died...

He couldn’t stop the questions and fears popping up in his mind pushing him on the edge of a panic attack, but he couldn’t allow his anxiety to take over. Not now...

He didn’t even know if he really wanted to make it to the end under such circumstances. He felt nausea thinking about the next morning. Knowing Monokuma something definitely would happen...and he would do everything possible to prevent it and safe as much of them as he could.

While being trapped in his dreary and gloomy thoughts, Shuichi completely lost track of time and his surroundings. That was why he nearly got a heart attack when he felt a sudden pain in his left side. He blinked and looked to his side, where he found a short boy sitting next to him looking bored.

Shuichi was pretty sure Kokichi interest in him today had partly to do with the upcoming motive, so he went along with Kokichi’s jokes. Thinking about the decision he had made after the other boy had left the dining hall, he looked forward what the day might bring.

He was a bit stunned when Kokichi insisted in spending time together, offering him to chose the conditions this time. Maybe this was for the best. Sometimes Kokichi tended to chose way too dangerous games to pass time, like playing with a knife. Yet it confused him a bit that he was the one deciding today. It didn’t help his worries that he couldn’t read Kokichi's expression after suggesting spending time at the library.

As a matter of fact Shuichi had already something in mind to play with Kokichi there. He had discovered it while looking over the topics of knowledge available in the library. Looking forward how Kokichi would react to it he didn’t even complain when he was dragged behind the other trough the academy.

Upon reaching the library the mood shifted a bit, because Kokichi hinted that he wasn’t so fond of his choice at all. Shuichi felt a bit hurt at this since the other condemned it already as boring before even knowing what he had in mind for them. It surprised him however when Kokichi immediately retreated his words, maybe he had seen a glimpse of his hurt? _Was he that easy to read?_

Nonetheless he felt hurt by first given the decision rights and then being laughed at. He gathered all his confidence and decided to further give Kokichi simple instructions, going through with his plan without asking the other if he still wanted to. Surprisingly the short boy followed his small orders without complaining once.

It turned out they both had a lot of fun, even Kokichi couldn’t hide completely how much he enjoyed it. Every time he tried to catch the culprit as fast as possible and managed to reach the best end with him, he seemed happy. Kokichi became only a bit grumpy when he tried it out alone and half-failed. Shuichi definitely didn’t take advantage of this half-failure to get revenge for the other boy’s constant teasing.

Also Shuichi had to admit, the awkwardness he felt the moment Kokichi simply sat down in his lap, vanished much too fast for his own good. Instead he would have never thought how comfortable it could feel to have the shorter boy sitting in his lap, while the warmth of his body was pressed against his chest. When he looked over Kokichi’s shoulder to get a better view at the book he had to confess the other looking really cute right there. He immediately suppressed those thoughts in favor of concentrating on their game.

Finally on their way to the dining hall to eat dinner he guided the topic towards the motive, therefore ruining the mood.

“That reminds me...” Shuichi began slowly, already knowing how Kokichi would react. “After you left in the morning we decided we would make our decision about whom to give our memory during dinner... Do you already know who you want to give your memory to?”

“Ah man, I said I didn’t want to speak about the memories during our free time! But since you mentioned it and ruined the atmosphere already-!” Kokichi said scowling.

“...Since I know how bad Saihara-chan wanted it, I will grant him with my memory!” he went on a wide smile plastered on his face.

“You want me to see your memory?” Shuichi asked innocently, as if he hadn’t already guessed where this would be going.

“...But that’s a lie! I would never trust Saihara-chan with something that important!”

Shuichi struggled a bit with the last words of the liar. Did he want to give him his memory or not? Either he could’ve called it a lie to tease Shuichi and hide that he truly wanted to trust him with his memory, or Kokichi didn’t want to give his memory to him at all, wanting him to suffer for even assuming it.

“Nishishi... But I could also be lying about it being a lie.”

That was when Shuichi decided to ignore the other boys teasing and simply going through with his plan, interested in the response he would get. 

“Then, whatever is true...,” he couldn’t hide the hint of the fear he felt rising inside him upon making such a decision and awaited Kokichi’s answer eagerly, “...will you see mine? It may be smart to just switch.”

 “If my beloved insists!”

 

* * *

 

After their final decision had been handed over to Monokuma during dinner, Shuichi was now strolling through the empty hallways of the academy, his gaze focused on the new rule written in his Monopad.

They all had asked how Monokuma would trick them in believing the memories and here was the answer to it. With a new rule added like this, there was no possibility they couldn’t act on what they would be seeing the next morning. It had become a terrifying truth.

While he was walking, deep in thoughts again, his feet stopped suddenly when he heard a sound right next to him. For one second he thought it sounded like laughter? A confused observation told him that the sound came from the basement, maybe someone was playing in the game room or watching a video right now?

He had to admit he was curios, so he decided to have a look who was behind the voice. Shuichi went down the stairs and opened the door to the game room, only to bump into a startled Tsumugi. She did not look like she had expected anyone to come here at this time of day. She had been focused on something on her Monopad, probably trying to distract herself from the threat that hung over them.

The moment Shuichi opened the door he had made the poor girl jump, her Monopad slipping out of her fingers and falling to the ground. It made a dull sound when it hit the floor.

“Ah, I’m so sorry I didn’t mean to startle you that bad!” he said grabbing for the Monopad and giving it back to its rightful owner without another look. Luckily it wasn’t broken.

“Oh it...it’s okay,” Tsumugi reassured him, “I just was feeling upset and couldn’t stand being alone with my plain self in my room. So I came here in hope for a light distraction. When you came in I was thinking about if I wanted to watch a movie or play something. ”

“I know what you mean,” Shuichi answered her, “I’m wandering through the academy because I’m also not calm enough to stay in my dorm room for now.”

“Yeah. Back there I would only think about tomorrow resulting in making me feel even worse.”

Shuichi nodded. He was familiar with what Tsumugi was saying, he felt the same after all. “It’s the same for me. Would it help if we play something together to pass a bit of time?”

“If you want to waste your time on a plain girl like me.” The words came slowly out of her mouth as if she wasn’t sure of it being the right choice. Despite her tone she looked relieved not to be alone with her thoughts anymore.

They decided to play darts, resulting in Shuichi losing poorly to Tsumugi because half of his throws were more aimed at the wall than at the score plate. During the game they chatted lightly about anything but the motive and the killing game until Tsumugi let out a loud yawn and excused herself with the need to go to bed. Shuichi accompanied her back to the dorms since it was nearly time to met with Kaito for their training session and he didn’t want to miss it, especially not today. After saying goodbye to Tsumugi he went to his dorm room only to be lured out again by Kaito exactly 5 minutes after the night time announcement.

“Ready for training, bro?” he said, “I think we really need it today.”

Shuichi simply nodded and went out with Kaito into the lobby where Maki was already waiting.

Training turned out to be as exhausting as ever, so it was no surprise that he began to sweat badly during his attempt to reach his 100 push-ups. It wasn’t a surprise too that Maki finished her push-ups when he barely had reached 60. Nonetheless it granted him some time were his mind was completely focused on moving his body, not able to think about anything else.

He was so focused on his workout that he didn’t even notice what was happening next to him until Maki spoke up: “Well I finished and Saihara-kun is also nearly at his...end.” She didn’t exactly carry out how she meant it but his attention already skipped to her next words: “Why don’t you exercise? Wasn’t it you that told us to do so?”

_Huh? Kaito hadn’t trained at all_?

He was used to that the astronaut did only half of the exercise he expected from them, but _nothing_ was totally unlike him...

“I’m here to support you two!” Kaito explained, “To get your minds off of that motive!”

“And what is with...ngh...you?” Shuichi gasped between his last push-ups, his arms feeling like burning.

“I don’t let myself get down from such lies! I believe everyone will be able to get around with it! We only need to work together and believe in our friends.”

Shuichi gave Maki a short glance, seeing a expression of skepticism similar to his in her face. They both didn’t believe it would be that easy, not with Monokuma involved.

He finally collapsed on the ground having reached his 100 push-ups. Before he could try to argument that Kaito’s notion may be a bit too optimistic, the tall boy started coughing madly.

“Kaito...,” Shuichi got out, still panting from the workout.

“Is everything okay?” asked Maki. It was rare Shuichi saw her with a worried expression.

“Of course!” Kaito shouted, trying to convince them with a loud laughter that escaped his mouth. “Only a little cold! Nothing the luminary of the stars can’t handle!”

“Are you sure?” Somehow he couldn’t fully believe Kaito’s words, but it was no use if the astronaut didn’t want to talk about it. Also it irritated him that Kaito had put one of his hands in a pocket of his pants after regaining from his coughing. This was also unlike him.

“Sure!” Kaito snapped and with that the topic was dropped. “We should head inside and take some rest before tomorrow. Like we discussed before, let us meet after watching that shit and talk us trough. We only need to make sure everyone attends the meeting and no one’s dropping out!”

“Yeah you’re right,” Shuichi agreed.

Upon rising from their position on the grass Shuichi saw Kaito stumbling from the corner of his eyes. The tall boy had lost his balance after hastily standing up and was now trying to regain it. Maki next to him didn’t turn her eyes off of him.

“Let’s go back I want to sleep,” Maki announced still observing Kaito for further signs of inexplicable weakness.

Both of them began to walk into the direction of the dormitory. Shuichi was about to follow them when he heard a rustling sound behind him.

“You two go ahead. I’ll go a last round around the courtyard before sleeping,” Shuichi said staying behind.

“That’s the right spirit, bro!” Kaito smiled. “Ah, but I want to tell you something before we separate... Promise me you will be careful tomorrow, will you? I mean after all its Ouma-kun’s memory.”

“I will,” he simply answered before Kaito and Maki excused themselves and went back to their rooms. Shuichi instead chose to walk into the direction he had heard the noise before, only to find a short boy with blackish-purple hair lying in the grass between some bushes.

“So Momota-chan and Maki Roll are concerned my memory will fuck you up?” he said while laughing. Shuichi takes his place next to the boy in the clammy grass, mostly because his muscles are screaming for rest after his exertion.

“Its Monokuma’s doing... I think we should all be wary,” Shuichi answered truthfully.

“You think Momota-chan takes it too easy?” Kokichi asked looking up at him.

“...Maybe. I have to admit I’m more concerned now because of that new added rule.”

The other showed him an unreadable expression. “Nishishi... Saihara-chan shouldn’t worry too much, after all a memory from a marvelous supreme leader like me can’t be that bad. Also my beloved detective is much too smart to take advantage before thinking it through!”

“...”

Kokichi seemed to sense his tension because he looked at him with a quizzically expression. “What is it?”

“It’s just... I’m trying to assume the worst, but I can’t get myself to think like that about us. It’s really hard... I mean what should I expect?” Shuichi’s voice unmistakably began to shake, while he was just spitting out the thoughts that hunted his mind.

“It feels like I’m locked out of my own body while someone will try to force a memory on me that won’t fit at all... Well that sounds even weirder if spoken out loud...”

Shuichi sighed detaching from his chaotic thoughts. “...Aren’t you worried what you will see tomorrow?”

“Nope.”

“That’s a lie, isn’t it?” he checked back, getting no answer from Kokichi. After a short moment of silence Shuichi decided to tell the other boy what was hunting him the most: “...What if you will see me doing terrible things... I mean like murder someone or be responsible for it?”

“Do you think that?” Kokichi asked curios.

“I don’t know!” Shuichi shouted frustrated, hiding his face in his arms. “I just have no idea! So I try to assume the worst I could come up with!”

“Hmm...okay if that is the case I will come and talk to you like Shirogane-chan had suggested! ...It may be true, that it would be for the best if we didn’t keep the memories to ourselves.”

Kokichi reached up and forced his arms out of his face. “You look really bad Saihara-chan! But all we can do now is wait-!”

“Hmm...” Shuichi simply hummed as answer.

“But isn’t it a bit weird?” Kokichi said staring at him awaiting his response.

“What do you mean?”

“Judging from Monokuma’s anger the Mastermind seems to be in a deep need of a new murder. Maybe we’re getting boring!” Kokichi explained his statement.

“Huh?” Shuichi still was oblivious to what exactly the other boy wanted to tell him.

“Don’t you think it felt rushed with what they came up for a new motive, after the disaster with the key card and the Neo World Program? Probably our little memory motive is just improvised to make the killing game interesting again!” Kokichi grinned.

“Hm...” Kokichi’s words got Shuichi into thinking, he couldn’t deny the other boy had a point. All of it had indeed seemed rushed and improvised. “If that’s the case maybe they’re making mistakes due to not being able to plan beforehand. Mistakes that can give us some hints...”

“...we only have to go through the memories first.”

 

* * *

 

When Shuichi finally made his way back to his room and opened the door he stilled for a moment. There on his table stood a little plant. Upon closer investigation he found out that it happened to be the potted banyan tree that could be won from the MonoMonoMachine.

Not in a million years could he make sense of why this was here, though he always had liked the thought of having a banyan tree, since he found it calming to look upon.

Maybe he would have never found out how it got to his room if it hadn’t been for the tag attached to the little tree: _Thanks for our little game today~! I toootally forgot to give you your present, since you had so nice ones for me every time! See you tomorrow. Don’t kill me then because of my memory <3\. _

Did he break into his room!?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! Next Chapter is memory time!


	4. Downfall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I want to die... I want to die...but first I want them to suffer the same pain I had to go through...to be the one in power for once... then I can die happily.”
> 
> -
> 
> “I will work as hard as I can!” “I will come up with the best, most gruesome murders, I promise. Everyone will love it!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi!  
> I have to admit that story turned out to be a bit longer than expected :)) Outgoing from the first notes I liked to explore some ideas and well...I think I have to raise up the total number of chapters a little bit, since I don't want to rush things. 
> 
> Maybe it was better this chapter took longer than I wanted it to be (I hate migraine), since it wouldn't have been a nice birthday present for poor Kokichi.
> 
> Phini off ;)

When Shuichi felt himself waking up and drifting back into consciousness the fear accompanying him since yesterday came back with all might. _It was time._ The 24 hours provided by Monokuma were probably over by now, the motive waiting for him to be watched. He opened his eyes hesitantly and switched the lights on only to be greeted with the sight of his dim lit room. Obviously they still were on emergency power, evidence that Kokichi and Kiibo had given Monokuma a hard time. The day prior he had seen the Exisal’s working in the backyard the whole day to repair the caused damage as fast as possible. It seemed they hadn’t managed to fix whatever was destroyed up until now.

He let his eyes wander over the furnishings in his rooms. At first glance all of it looked normal like it had been yesterday evening when he was going to sleep. _Maybe there was still some time before the limit expires?_ The morning announcement also hadn’t played yet. _No, wait._ Monokuma had told them that this was because of the monitors not working with the restricted power the academy were running on.

He got out under his sheets, making himself ready in the bathroom for breakfast. Still he couldn’t hold down the anxious feelings rising inside him, the painful anticipation about what was to come. Despite his better knowledge he tried to open his door when he came out of his bathroom and failed. _Great._ Monokuma hadn’t lied about locking them in their rooms until they had watched what they didn’t want to see, not allowed to leave otherwise.

He turned around to go to his bed again waiting for the motive to come when his eyes fell on a small clear-blue case lying on the table in front of the TV. Without the couch covering it from his view it was not to be overlooked. _A DVD? What happened to the Kubs Pad’s?_

After their experience with the second motive, and the fact that this one seemed to be something equal, he would have thought to find another Pad again. Not to mention the unsettling feeling that _again_ some of them had been in his room delivering the motive while he was sleeping.

With barely any present motivation he grabbed the case and fetched out the DVD to put it in the player built-in into the TV. His hands were trembling slightly but he had no other choice then to watch whatever Monokuma had in stock for them. It would be the best if he got it over with as fast as possible to finally be able to leave his room again.

Kokichi’s memory... Shuichi had no idea what to expect. Before he finally pushed the play button to start the video he tried to calm himself down as best as he could.

_Despite what you may see...you need to watch it neutrally,_ he told himself, _After that you can go and talk with Kokichi about it...and about yours...you don’t know what he might see._

His finger still hovering over the button he finally got the courage to press down and start the video. The TV springing to life providing only static at first. In hindsight he had to admit what he would see was not what he had expected...

The first to break through the static was Monokuma, showing himself in his usual seat in front of a table filled with food and drinks, more than someone would be able to eat. He smiled, showing his sharp teeth, a look they had grown to hate so much because it never meant anything good for them. “Good mooorning~!” the black and white bear chimed, “I know how much you already wait for the actually memory to start, but first I need to give a short note at the beginning, because _I can’t communicate with you bastards over the monitors anymore due to this fuckin’ brats doing..._ ” 

“I had to rely on DVD’s!” Monokuma shouted angry. “Not to mention how much time it took to get the memories on them! I hope your happy now brat!” He suddenly started cackling. “This will be the last moment for a long time!”

Well, Monokuma, or better to say the mastermind, still seemed to be pretty mad at Kokichi for causing the blackout. Maybe the supreme leader had been right about what he told him after his training session with Kaito and Maki. Maybe...just maybe the blackout had been influenced the mastermind more than they would show them. Considering Monokuma’s anger and hints about what wasn’t working at the moment and the fact how desperately the Exisal’s tried to repair the damage... It was a small glimpse of hope. If it turned out to be true, they could take advantage of it. He only had to stay careful. _How much of your technology doesn’t work right now, Monokuma?_

A sudden change of tone brought him back to the present, that he had a video to follow and shouldn't shutting himself in in his thoughts. _Well maybe that would be the better choice..._

“...aaand now to the painful awaited final part of this video! It’s time for the memory!”

_Damn it!_ He had missed a good part of Monokuma’s ‘notes’, hoping it hadn’t been anything important, he refocused on the screen.

After Monokuma’s final words the screen had turned black for a few seconds, only to light up again with what looked like a nearly empty hallway of some High School. Judging from the way and angle Shuichi saw the environment he concluded he must see it through the eyes of a rather short person. _Most probably_ _Kokichi(?)_

Before he was able to fully comprehend what he was looking at an arm snatched into view grabbing around the thin and fragile wrist of Kokichi(?). There was no yelp or other sound coming from the person, he was seeing the memory through, despite being dragged harshly away from the main hallway into an empty boy’s restroom, by what looked like a group of four other students. Shuichi couldn’t get a real look at them since Kokichi(?) chose to focus his gaze on the ground.

All he could make out in the corner of his view were a shadow standing by the door guarding it, while two others remain in standing on Kokichi’s(?) left and right sight. The fourth student he couldn’t see.

The one on Kokichi’s(?) right sight was suddenly pinning the poor boy against the door of a toilet, reducing his vision even more with his black school uniform. Still no sound left the boy’s lips, like he was way too used to all of it. “So you still have the guts to show up that disgusting face of yours? At last I hope you have something with you to help make us forgot we have to tolerate you the whole day now,” the shadow pinning Kokichi(?) against the door suddenly spoke up.

Despite the nearly blocked vision he could see the shadow on the left starting to search through the bag and the pockets of the boy to come up with nothing. Shuichi could see a dangerous shadow in the eyes of the attacker. “Nothing...but what should we expect from an abortion like him, even his parents are despising his presence.”

Seemingly frustrated about not getting anything worthy from the short boy, the right shadow let him loose only to hit him without another warning with his first in the stomach. Kokichi(?) immediately slid down the door and held his arms protectively over the hurt part. A painful gasp escaped his mouth, the first sound Shuichi had ever heard the boy making. When the second fist hit him in his side he started to whimper. Badly for him his new position on the ground only gave his attackers more space to also start kicking him. After what felt like an eternity of pain for the poor boy, he had curled up into a ball, his eyes tightly shut, waiting for the last hit to come. “Don’t bother showing up again if you have nothing to ease our pain upon seeing the disgusting you. Why don’t you do everyone a favor and just vanish already? Hopefully forever.”

After a short moment of silence Shuichi heard a door open and shut again in the complete darkness he was in since the boy had closed his eyes. Even as the school bell rang Kokichi(?) didn’t move. Several minutes of silence and darkness later he slowly opened his lids looking at the restroom floor.

His body was shaking when he tried to stand up, weakness forcing him nearly down again. Still he made his way over to the sinks and mirrors, giving Shuichi for the first time a look at the boy, who indeed turned out to be the supreme leader he had grown to know, but in the same moment he looked completely foreign to Shuichi. The expression he made was one Shuichi had never seen on the short boy. A look of someone who had given-up a long time ago.

Staring in the mirror Shuichi could already see the new bruises forming over the boy’s bare skin, a train of blood tripping from his right ear. His face showing a blank expression, just like his Kokichi’s, no emotion there to detect. Only his eyes had a cold and death glint which made Shuichi shiver and let him fear for the boy.

While Kokichi was observing himself in the mirror he opened his mouth to speak. The words coming out were as emotionless as his stare: “I want to die... I want to die...but first I want them to suffer the same pain I had to go through...to be the one in power for once... then I can die happily.” Upon the last words a painful smile had formed on his face, making Shuichi’s blood ran cold.

Finally the screen of his TV went black, the video being at his end, leaving back a panic-struck Shuichi. Of all things he imagined Kokichi’s memory could turn out this was none of it. This definitely wasn’t the Kokichi he knew... Still the meaning of his last sentence...

What did Monokuma wanted to reach with that memory? After all there was no real hint in Kokichi’s memory, which could someone entice in killing the supreme leader because of that. If anything, all it originated in Shuichi was the want to hug the shorter boy and comfort him, to tell him everything would be fine. _What a confusing thought._

When Shuichi trusted his feet enough to stand up he went over to his door, finding it unlocked again, to go and find Kokichi.

 

* * *

 

The first Kokichi had tried after waking up in the morning was to get out of his room. After pulling at the door handle for what felt like the hundredth time and nearly the same number of attempts on lock-picking his way out he finally gave up. _Damn it!_

It seemed there truly was no way avoiding that motive video. His gaze shifted back to the DVD case on his table. Upon waking up his eyes had immediately captured the location of the object, since the Kubs Pad had also been laid down there.

_No way to avoid it, huh?_

Kokichi sighed defeated and got the DVD out of its case to put it in the player. He took his place on the couch, legs outstretched over the table and arms crossed over his chest, waiting for the worst to begin. It was Shuichi’s memory after all, no way that could turn out bad, could it?

When the video finally started it was Monokuma’s visage that greeted him first. “Good mooorning~!” the bear grinned, “I know how much you already wait for the actually memory to start, but first I need to give a short note at the beginning, because _I can’t communicate with you bastards over the monitors anymore due to this fuckin’ brats doing..._ ” 

Even if he hadn’t intended it, if it made Monokuma and the mastermind that angry Kokichi was proud of causing the blackout and therefore trouble for them. It seemed something good had come out of his little prank on Kiibo.

“I had to rely on DVD’s!” Monokuma went on obviously furious. “Not to mention how much time it took to get the memories on them! I hope your happy now brat!” He started cackling. “This will be the last moment for a long time!”

When Monokuma continued his speech, Kokichi was pretty sure this was his DVD exclusive: ”Yes I mean you, you little bastard!” Kokichi rolled his eyes. “Let’s see how long that smile will remain on your face, after I’m done with you! I have something really special prepared for you. So go on let us have some fun!”

“Try,” Kokichi mumbled at the TV, not really afraid, “You won’t get me that easy!”

“Upupu~ I hope you will enjoy watching the dark parts of your lovely classmates past! And don’t forget to confront them later about it! Oh that will be so much fun~! No need to hold yourselves back,” Monokuma screamed happily. “You wouldn’t want to risk getting your classmates hurt because of one person going insane due to you deciding to keep back the memory!” Another pause before Monokuma blurted out his last words: “...aaand now to the painful awaited final part of this video! It’s time for the memory!”

The screen went black and Kokichi couldn’t stop himself from tensing up. _Time for Monokuma to begin his show._

Kokichi found himself looking around a dim lit room. He wasn’t able to see much of his environment since a cap was placed to deeply into the face of the one he was seeing this memory through. _Shuichi(?)_

The most Kokichi could recognize were dark floorboards and a nearly black corner were Shuichi(?) was staring at. For one second he thought he saw a small red light blinking at the corner of his vision, but it was gone now and Kokichi pushed it off as his imagination. A light shiver ran down his spine when Shuichi(?) began to speak. The voice was missing any emotion at first, sounding too much like the one Kokichi used when he hid behind his mask trying to fool and manipulate the people around him.

“My name is Saihara Shuichi.” Well that settled it. But to whom was he speaking? From the point where Shuichi's gaze was fixed on he couldn’t see anything or anyone at all. When the boy spoke up again a new tone had crept its way inside his voice, a tone so foreign for the timid detective that it caused Kokichi goose bumps.

“I will work as hard as I can!” _Huh?_ What was he talking about? “I will come up with the best, most gruesome murders, I promise. Everyone will love it!”

_What the-!?_ This...this couldn’t be his Shuichi... This had to be someone else memory...but he had said his name at the beginning...

The enthusiasm when he spoke the last words made Kokichi want to throw up. _What did that mean-!?_ This had to be some cruel trick from Monokuma, had it not? Still the memory wasn’t at his end and continued after his environment suddenly changed to an empty hallway.

Someone was standing in front of Shuichi’s field of vision, but thanks to the damn hat all Kokichi could see were a pair of dark pants and a white button-up shirt. “Are you ready to go?” the person asked.

“Yes!” Shuichi’s enthusiastic voice sounded through the long hallway. “I’ve never felt more satisfied in my life!”

“We know you won’t disappoint us and ensure things won’t be boring!” the stranger replied, “Just go down the hallway and show them how to feel despair!”

This was something Shuichi didn’t need to be told twice, so he headed down the hallway and everything went black for Kokichi.

When his reality went back to his dorm room Kokichi could feel his heart pounding madly in his chest. _No!_ What he had seen couldn’t been true... There was no way this was a memory of Shuichi. In this memory he sounded like some insane boy who likes the thought of murders and to... _plan..._ them. He sounded like...like he was the mastermind who put them all through this hell.

Kokichi tried desperately to catch his breath, because he felt like drowning. _No!_ Not Shuichi he couldn’t be-! The only person he had been willing to trust somewhat.

It was his logical voice that finally managed to overpower the shocked state his mind had fallen into after seeing the memory. _If he truly is the mastermind, why should he show you this? Making it more than clear. Why should he reveal himself to you?_

Could it be a trick from Monokuma to make him think Shuichi was the mastermind behind their killing game? The mastermind would have never chosen a video revealing who they truly are, therefore it had to be some trick to frame Shuichi and mess with him! Hadn’t Monokuma told him he had something special prepared for him?

Still, the added rule confirmed that all he saw had to be a true memory of the detective. What...what if the mastermind had done everything on purpose, to lure him to them? Maybe it was a trap for him set up by...by Shuichi? The one none of them would ever suspect. _No!_

His mind refused to believe it. Wasn’t it more likely the mastermind wanted to plant the seeds of mistrusting Shuichi in his mind? _But still..._ At some point in his past Shuichi had said _that_ , otherwise the killing game would’ve ended by now with Monokuma breaking a rule. Considering the bear really hold onto the rules like he hoped.

From the beginning Kokichi had known Monokuma would try to trick them with the motive... What should he do now? Approaching the other students or approaching Shuichi and talking about what he had seen? Would the others even tell what they might have seen? Just as likely as they would believe him when Kokichi tried to describe what he had witnessed in Shuichi’s memory.

Maybe he should try to speak alone to Shuichi first? _But what if it is a trap?_ Shuichi probably didn’t remember anything of the memory, like Kokichi himself had no idea about his, so there wouldn’t be much risk, would it? _If he does not happen to be the mastermind, then he would've remembered from the beginning_. Kokichi felt unsure what to do, especially because now he truly feared what Shuichi might have seen about him...

He stood up considering going out of his room, figuring on his way out who he should talk to when suddenly his door bell rang. It seemed someone had beaten him to it. With slight hesitation Kokichi decided to open the door and there he was his beloved detective...

 “Hi...”

“...Saihara-chan.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry I had to split the chapter here, but I promise the next chapter won't take too long!


	5. Parasite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kokichi didn’t know what to respond to *that*. He laughed it off like usual, at least he *tried* to. He joked about Shuichi’s mental state, how he could imagine such stupid things, at least he *wanted* to. He told Shuichi that this was nothing but a silly lie, at least he *attempted* to.
> 
> His mouth kept opening but nothing came out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't sure about the rating anymore, but the added tags say it all...
> 
> I thank you all so much for reading this story and for your comments and kudos! I really didn't now myself that my spontaneous idea would turn out like the story it is now. It just happened while writing ;)

“Hi...”

“...Saihara-chan.” Even if Kokichi kept his face completely blank and his voice without any trace of emotion, the short pause before saying Shuichi’s name out loud happened to be there. No way to withdraw now.

Both boys stared awkwardly at each other not knowing how to address what they had just seen some minutes before. He didn’t miss that he couldn’t find a hint in the detective’s eyes that showed the same awful feeling he felt welling up inside him again. Instead was that a glimmer of _pity_ in his eyes? Shuichi seemed to observe him as much as he examined him. The other boy’s eyes narrowed a bit upon coming to the conclusion that Kokichi obviously tried to hide his emotions about the memory from him. And he detected it as bad as it was, the shadow over his face growing a bit darker.

“...was it that...bad?” His voice broke halfway during the whispered sentence. “Should we s-speak about what we have seen?”

“Ah...” Kokichi tried to come up with something, no matter what, but for the first time his mind refused to think of a sufficient lie. “I’m not sure I want to know mine after...” ... _seeing yours._

“...Saihara-chan’s wasn’t that bad at all!” he quickly lied, unfortunately the detective kept up too fast: “...that’s a lie, isn’t it? You won’t even let me in your room.”

Kokichi sighed and made the detective space to finally come in, carefully closing the door after him, but not before he shot a short glance through the dormitory finding every other door still closed. _Are they still watching the memory? Or are they too afraid to come out?_ He had to find out later, at the moment Kokichi had his own problem to solve in shape of a tall detective.

He also admired Shuichi's determination to stay focused on their problem even when he examined the mess the other boy's room was. His gaze stopped for a moment on the wax figure of Rantaro, Kokichi could see the question in his eyes, but Shuichi decided against asking, at least for the moment.

“...So what was my memory about?” Shuichi asked hesitantly.

As little as he wanted to know about his own memory the thought about telling Shuichi _his_ was completely impossible in his eyes. Kokichi’s only chance was to come up with a distraction. But how should he get the detective's attention away from his own memory? The glorious idea his mind came up with was: “Nishishi~ Won’t tell you until you didn’t told me mine!” _Well Kokichi,_ he told himself, _that was the dumbest thing you could come up with._

He considered for a moment to simply run away and leave Shuichi alone in his room, not really a good option though, but better than staying and discussing memories he want to forget. _I can’t forget it,_ he thought, _I need to know..._

“Ah well...” Shuichi began struggling to get something out. He seemed as nervous as Kokichi. Maybe he truly misread the memory and Shuichi didn’t remember anything of it. “I saw...I saw how you were beaten up by a group of students in some High School not saying or doing anything at all...T-They told you that no one cared about you not even your parents...When they left you lying on the floor y-you said...” He paused obviously forcing the words out he didn’t want to speak out loud. “...that you wanted to die. B-But only after making them suffer the same pain...” It seemed Shuichi wanted to cut it off here but then he forced out a few more words. “...you looked broken.”

Kokichi didn’t know what to respond to _that._ He laughed it off like usual, at least he _tried_ to. He joked about Shuichi’s mental state, how he could imagine such stupid things, at least he _wanted_ to. He told Shuichi that this was nothing but a silly lie, at least he _attempted_ to.

His mouth kept opening but nothing came out. His voice had never failed him before! _What happened to him?_

Neither Shuichi’s gaze, nor his behavior, nor anything about that fucking memory was what stunned Kokichi. When the words had left the detective's mouth it felt like every letter tried to contaminate his mind upon spoken out loud. Like black poison it was running through his veins, spreading over his whole body.

“...Ouma-kun?” he heard Shuichi asking.

Instead of an answer he started to cry. _Wait what? **He's able to kill me.**_

He began to tremble when Shuichi took a step closer, absolutely no idea what was happening to him, why he suddenly started to cry. _Well if I only knew. **Because he is stronger than me, like everyone is.**_

Normally he could relate on fake tears to the amount that he was able to manipulate others. And now, he couldn’t stop himself from crying like some pathetic child.

“...Ouma-kun?” Shuichi frowned. “Why are you crying? What happened?”

“Dunno...” Kokichi managed to get out, dodging Shuichi’s attempt in getting closer. “Just ignore it.”

“But then...” he said irritated. “C-Can you tell me mine now?”

“No,” was all he could get his voice to say, sounding terrified despite his desperate try to hold on a cold tone.

“W-Why?”

**_He wants to kill me, he is the mastermind of this mess after all._ **

To tell the truth there was no reason he could came up with other than the darkness in his mind was telling him to do so. That he would die if he did. **_I’m the one that will end my life not someone else._**

Being trapped in the thoughts swirling in his head making no sense at all, Kokichi definitely missed when Shuichi came closer again. When he finally noticed he was trapped between the wall and the detective with only a small space to escape. **_He will hurt me like everyone does._**

“Ouma-kun!” Shuichi shouted confused. “Please tell me wha-”

“I said no!!!” **_He will hurt me either way._**

Kokichi was at a complete loss with no idea what was happening in this room right now. Shuichi instead looked frustrated and perplexed upon his shouted words. It really came out of the blue when Shuichi suddenly pressed him against the wall and slapped his cheek.

“Please! You’re acting weird!” Shuichi pleaded while holding him in place. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to...but please tell me what’s happening.”

**_I've already seen what you truly want, to have us all die horrible deaths._ **

“No! J-Just kill me already!” Kokichi whined. “It’s not like you didn’t plan our awful deaths beforehand!”

“What are you talking about?”

“You planned all of that! You’re insane!” Kokichi shouted using Shuichi's confusion to his advantage to slip past the other boy and ran away from him. Luckily the dormitory was still empty when he sprinted down the stairs and out of the building. **_Run and hide. Let them suffer._** His mind was clouded in darkness and his vision was blurry, no way he could find out this way where his body was carrying him.

**_I should die. This would make everything easier, everyone happier. I should die._ **

Kokichi didn’t know how he ended up in a dark corner of the warehouse, sitting on the cold floor while still crying. He also didn’t know how a piece of a broken mug ended up in his hands. He couldn’t even tell when he started to use it to cut open the skin at his arm, the red staining his white clothes.

Now, there weren’t only the dark clouds but also a dangerous dizziness rising inside him. Finally breaking through his abused mind, like hearing it from far away, was the voice of Monokuma: “A body has been discovered. Everyone, please gather in the dormitory.”

**_Why I’m not the death body?_ **

He didn’t know how it finally happened but there it was, a small hole in the dark clouds taking over his whole being and the Kokichi who still wanted to fight used that to his advantage.

_Fuck you!,_ he told himself or at least the disgusting voice inside him, that came with the memory. _What the hell is going on?_

With a surprised yelp he let the ceramic shard fall to the ground. This was not him! This disgusting memory must have planted some parasite inside him to wreck him. After all the foreign thoughts had popped up in his head and clouded his mind after Shuichi had told him about his memory. _Was that...even possible?_

**_It’s nothing here to live for. Here I can finally have what I wanted._ **

_Just shut up! ...Wait am I fighting with myself now? Now I’m really going insane..._

His heart hammered when he was pressing his body against the cold wall. Panic seeking through in his mind. _No!_ He was better than that. He was Ouma Kokichi, the Ultimate Supreme Leader and not that weakling Shuichi had described to him from the memory given to him, the same weakling who tried to taint his thoughts and take over his being. No he wouldn’t allow that, he needed to stay confident, for the others... **_Let them suffer they deserve it. Everyone deserves it._** _No!_ He wouldn’t allow the other Kokichi to take over, if anything he might be able to balance them out, since it seemed not to be an option to get the invader that easily out of his head.

Finally his heartbeat started to calm down, being soothed by the comfortable fact that he was alone. _Alone with myself._ But then another thought made him shiver.

_Oh god...Please I didn’t tell him anything, did I? This one mistake I made it wasn’t enough to make him remember...hopefully..._

**_Hopefully..._ **

_Am I mocking myself?_

He wanted to die. At least half of him wanted to.

Kokichi stood up on weak and trembling legs because he found out it would be better to find something to treat the damage he had caused to his arm, the cuts which were still bleeding. Fortunately he found alcohol and bandages on the shelves so he could tend to his wounds. **_I should just let it out._**

Ignoring the pathetic voice Kokichi disinfected his cuts, what caused him to wince a little, due to the burning pain. Then he bandaged his arm. After another few minutes of getting himself together he was finally able to convince himself that he needed to go where Monokuma had ordered them to go. So he went out of the warehouse from where he had been hiding directly to the dormitory.

Before storming into the lobby of the dormitory he decided to first peer through the glass doors of the main entrance. All he could see where Maki, Tsumugi and Gonta standing in the lobby. Where was everyone else? Kokichi himself had needed long enough to finally being able to come here. Also he couldn’t see any hint of a body from his point of view.

Upon taking a closer look he noticed that the three of them were gathered in front of a special door. He didn’t know to which student it belonged but it definitely was the girl’s side. Who was missing from them? Miu and Himiko.

He hated the thought of having lost another one of them, but there was no turning back now. **His other voice just snorted**. Monokuma and the mastermind had won this round, their motive a full success.

One moment lost in his dreary thoughts he missed that he had been spotted by one of the three people, and this one was approaching him very fast. He was startled when suddenly the doors opened in front of him and he was lifted up from the ground by a strong hand grabbing his collar.

**_Hurt. Pain. Let them suffer._ ** _Shut up!_

“You!” Maki cried her eyes ice-cold. “Why are you hiding here? Were you spying on us?” At least for what it was worth that sounded like the old Maki.

Kokichi vision got blurry. _Wait. Damn it! I’m not crying again, am I? **I should just hold still, it makes it easier, less painful.**_

“You can save your crocodile tears Ouma,” Maki said tightening her grip on him. “The least we need now are your games.”

“Ah H-Harukawa-san!” he stuttered out. _What the hell is wrong with me!?_

His body fell with a loud thumb back to ground. “Ouch! That hurt!” he said looking up to the assassin. If he had to guess he would have said Maki would be looking at him with a cold and death glare, he would have never guessed that she actually looked _worried?_

“How did you call me?” she asked.

“Huh?”

“Ouma by any means had you been told about your memory?” Maki was now towering over him, making him flinch in her shadow. He looked away, desperately avoiding her stare, giving her at the same moment the evidence she was looking for.

His half-heartedly “...that was just a lie.” couldn’t repair the damage made anymore.

In the next second she was slapping him. **_Let them do as they please, they will suffer in the end._** “Stop being pathetic,” she told him, “The least I need in this situation is a useless Ouma and a missing Saihara-kun.”

He stopped crying. “Saihara-chan is missing?”

“As are Iruma-san, Kiibo-kun and Momota-kun,” Maki answered, “They haven’t shown up here since the body announcement had played. Neither did Monokuma.”

“So you’ve heard from your memory then and it changed something inside you, am I right?” she said bluntly dropping the other topic about the missing students. “You’re definitely not yourself. So Saihara-kun told you?”

“Yes,” he didn’t even know himself why he answered truthfully, “You aren’t much different though.”

“I got in a fight with Momota-kun about his memory and he left before he could tell me anything,” Kokichi got as answer from Maki. A hope building up inside him. This could mean not all of them were poisoned by that damned memory! **_Why do I even bother that much?_** He sighed.

“Lucky you,” he told her.

Maki’s gaze shifted over him trying to find some hint, judging from what he thought about his actual mental state Kokichi didn’t thought it would be too difficult. He hadn’t bothered even trying to repair his broken mask up until now, too exhausted by keeping his little parasite in bay.

“You don’t look very happy, but it didn’t seem being influenced by your memory made you a threat.”

“Oh,” Kokichi stated his voice dropping of sullenness, “My memory was obviously just about a weak and pathetic boy who wanted to make others suffer because he hates his own life and wants to end it...”

“...”

“It’s really exhausting to fight every second with a complete opposite self of you,” he sighed.

“I’m sorry Ouma-kun. Now I’m really grateful Momota-kun didn’t tell me about my memory.” Maki sounded truly sorry.

“Eh?” he couldn’t stop himself from making a sound after hearing her using an honorific to his name. “Wow and now I even reached the state that Maki Roll pities me!” He definitely was not trying madly to get back to his normal self. “Not to mention that I didn’t lie once during that stupid conversation, because I’m too fuckin’ tired!” _Well that wasn’t meant to be spoken out loud._

The nickname was more an attempt to get himself back in a sane and familiar state, hoping to get some reaction from Maki but she didn’t even seem mad at him because of the use of her nickname, instead she smiled placatory at him. _When did that happen?_

“What happened to your arm?” she questioned pointing at the bandages and bloody sleeve.

“Falling down a staircase,” he shot out immediately. Maki only rolled her eyes. “And now the truth?”

“Man, you’re no fun!” Kokichi answered, “Maybe my past self from the memory found it fun to cut open my arm.”

“But there's one question I have,” Kokichi remarked, definitely _not_ trying to get Maki away from the thought that he had harmed himself. “I can’t believe Maki Roll is believing me that easily. I mean I could simply act like I had changed, making you pity me and then I will have you all where I want you.”

It didn’t have any real effect on Maki at all. What was wrong with her? Normally she sprang with pleasure on every ‘threat’ that came out of his mouth. _I’m not much of a ‘threat’ right now, am I? **I never was, that’s why I was the victim for everyone.**_

“Please don’t make this more difficult than it already is. And I know that you aren’t lying. I have seen the same change happening to Momota-kun,” she told him avoiding his gaze, “The things you said, how you described what happened it’s the same like...with him.”

With those words suddenly the black and white bear appeared inside the dormitory in front of the other two students still standing there looking lost.

“We should probably go inside and hear what he has to say,” Maki said not turning away her eyes from Monokuma.

Kokichi nodded then he started to laugh suddenly, causing Maki to look back at him like he had gone insane. Maybe he had. Upon walking into the dormitory he found out that he didn’t even ask who was dead. _Wait, hadn’t Maki told him Miu was only missing?_

When they got nearer to the small group he finally could see the little pixel picture of Himiko. _Why?_


	6. A full success

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maki simply shrugged, but also probably because they had reached their destination standing in front of the lab of the Ultimate Detective. What he definitely hadn’t expected upon Maki opening the door was to be greeted by the detective himself with the words: “You *two* are investigating together?” 
> 
> “...” Kokichi was for a moment too stunned to say anything.
> 
> “Where have you been?” Maki immediately shouted at him.

Staring at the lifeless body of Yumeno Himiko Kokichi's mind refused to think properly, as if it had functioned at all after that cursed memory. Even if her sleepy attitude had annoyed him most of the times, he had liked the way she stubbornly stayed with her opinion about being a mage. Mostly because it was a just too good possibility to tease her a lot and make her irate.

When Angie and Tenko had been still alive and the girl had been a lot happier, there had been one time when her lab just opened when she had showed him around with the fascination of an innocent child explaining to him all the devices and equipment. Kokichi had liked it, even if he had refused to show it.

_Why did she have to die? **She was as weak as I, only depending on others for solving her problems.**_

Himiko... She looked so untroubled, lying in her bed like she was only sleeping. There were no obvious wounds on her body to see, her head cuddled into the pillow and the sheets tugged comfortingly around her small figure. Her hat resting on her nightstand. _Peaceful._ At least they could investigate with the full support of the normal room lights now. The dim light was gone and judging from the former announcement the monitors were also working again, the academy back to the regular power system. Seemed like the Monokubs were finally able to fix it. _  
_

_How did she die?_ The only point destroying the peaceful illusion was the fact that there wasn't an up and down of her chest anymore. Himiko had stopped breathing forever.

Kokichi could feel Maki’s presence, the assassin only standing one step behind him also staring at the little _sleeping_ magician.

“So do you bastards want the Monokuma File now or not?” Monokuma interrupted their train of thoughts harshly, “My sweet Monokubs and I already spent the last half an hour to find every one of you bastards who didn’t came here to hand them the file! Take it! I really need some rest and that after just coming from vacation...”

“A-Ah, of course we take it,” Tsumugi said trying to hide away that her voice was shaking.

Nonetheless before taking it Maki used her chance to turn angrily at Monokuma. “Anyway, what was that trick with the memories? You didn’t say anything about that they would influence us!” she growled. _Shouldn’t I be the one to confront Monokuma? **Better not.**  
_

Monokuma took his chance happily to switch to the topic: “Upupu~! Ah so you found out about the secret the memories hold! Because it’s not only about seeing them! Also if the rightful owner recalls the memory by being told the main essence he will be influenced by his past truth! You truly ran to each other like obedient little sheep and told them all of it, not knowing that was the true motive!”

“Not having such a nice day up until now?” said Monokuma laughing while he handed Kokichi the Monokuma File. “Why are your eyes so red? Don’t tell me the mighty supreme leader had been crying like a little baby. I told you that you will regret messing with me!”

All Kokichi wanted to do in that moment was imagine very painful deaths for Monokuma and the mastermind. **_I could ask Shuichi._** _Please no._

“Just shut up and get lost,” Maki told the bear. Monokuma gave them a last nasty smile before he finally vanished.

To steady his trembling hands Kokichi grabbed the Pad, with the file on it, tighter concentrating on what information he could get out of it. They would need it after all for the trial.

‘Monokuma File #04: The victim happened to be Yumeno Himiko, the Ultimate Magician. The body had been found around 9:10 a.m. in her dorm room. Cause of death had been asphyxiation. There are no external wounds existing.’

“This literally screams poison,” Maki said after reading the file for herself. “With no visible wounds and the mentioned cause of death...if it had been from strangling there would be visible marks.”

Kokichi looked over to the assassin only to notice that Gonta and Tsumugi had already left the room after getting the file. His mind followed the words she had just said. “...from Saihara-chan’s lab?”

“Most probably,” she answered, “It’s the only place where such things are stored.”

“Then we should go there and find out,” Kokichi decided. While speaking he had approached Himiko’s body. There was an empty water bottle on her nightstand and an opened bag of sweets. He looked around the room, trying to find something unusual.

Still there was nothing that caught his eyes, only a scrap of paper lying next to the bed standing out in the otherwise pretty tidy room. Since when does the normally lazy mage had enough energy to clean up her room? Or did someone else clean it for her?

He picked the piece of paper up only to reveal half of a label, which obviously happened to be from a poison bottle. The name was barely readable but the skull marking the dangerous poison was there in full view.

“She had been crying a lot lately,” sounded Maki’s quiet voice from across the corner. “The trash bin is full of tissues. It had gone better...but what happened the last time is still hunting her.”

She came over to him. “Before we go to Saihara-kun’s lab should we talk to the other two first? From what I saw they went outside the dormitory after we received the file.”

Kokichi tilted his head looking surprised at Maki. “Eh? Did you really want to investigate with me, Maki Roll?” **_I’m nothing._**

“If you stop calling me by that name,” she said scowling. “It’s not that I have much choice you know, considering the other possibilities. And despite Monokuma’s intentions I think your actual state makes you more tolerable.”

“So Maki Roll likes me only when I’m a pathetic, self-hating weakling.”

“I should probably investigate on my own you’re annoying me too much,” Maki stated. “Also I don’t think you’re only that. To me it looks like you’re...both?”

“Nonetheless,” she went on leaving him no time to respond to her statement, “I think four eyes would be better than two, since our situation seems to be pretty messed up at the moment. We don’t know how long Monokuma will grant us time to investigate, that’s why we should use it to the best of our ability.”

“You’re...right,” he admitted, even if he didn’t want to. How much he hated himself in that moment for being too honest for too long. **_If I'm only a lie too what does it even matter anymore?_**

“Do you have any idea where Saihara-kun is?” Maki asked when they finally left Himiko’s room much to his delight.

“Probably killing more people,” Kokichi while showing her a really serious version of his face.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

He sighed deeply as if Maki was forcing him to tell things that were way too obvious. “Nope. I haven’t seen him since I ran away after he told me about my great past self.”

“Okay then let us talk with the other two now.”

“Fiiine,” Kokichi said strolling behind Maki out of the dorms.

Luckily his other self's voice had kept bearable distant, still even if he could shut out the voice his character doesn’t feel the same like before. He had tried insulting and making fun of Maki with, for example, the use of her nickname, he had tried lying and messing with their investigation but it was...hard. He could separate the thoughts in his head pretty easy by now, nonetheless his past self had laid a shadow over his normal being, one he couldn’t free himself from that easy. When he tried to act like before it hindered him every single time to get his control completely back. Still he would never allow himself to give up to this parasite.

Upon exiting the building they found a nervous Gonta going up and down the way between the stairs and the main entrance of the academy, while Tsumugi had let herself fallen down into the grass next to the dormitory entrance looking totally lost. They approached her first.

“What happened with your memory Shirogane-san?” Maki got straight to the point.

“I don’t...” she looked away horrified. “I don’t know... I-I wanted to speak with Kiibo-kun about his memory first but he wasn’t in his dorm room so I tried calling Yumeno-san next to ask her about mine...b-but she didn’t answer either. I grew really worried so I tried to open their doors and Yumeno-san's turned out to be already open.”

“Had it been forced open?” Maki wanted to know. _I feel useless._ ** _I feel so useless._**

“Huh? N-No I mean I didn’t see anything damaged at the door or doorframe. If that’s what you wanted to ask.”

“Maybe Yumeno-chan forgot to lock her door and Shirogane-chan used that to her advantage, sneaked into the room and killed the poor mage, who didn’t know what happened to her!” Well at least his old self wanted to contribute one thing to the interrogation. All he got as answer was a death glare from Maki and a push in his side. That was more than he had gotten as response to his behavior in the last hours. Still it didn’t felt the same like before. He probably had to try harder.

“N-No!” Tsumugi cried.

“Just ignore him,” Maki explained, “He tries to outsmart his memory personality.”

“W-What does that mean?” While Maki explained the blue-haired girl what the real meaning of the memories had been, Kokichi focused on his environment. Somewhere along their conversation Gonta had come over to their group and was now listing in to what Maki had to say. And was that a glimpse of black near the main entrance? Shuichi?

“How plainly horrible,” Tsumugi whispered. “H-How can someone come up with such awful things?”

“What happened when you found her?” Maki asked getting them finally back to the main topic.

“When I got i-in... I found her...like she was still asleep. I-I got over to her and tried to wake her up and that’s when I realized she...she wasn’t breathing.” It seemed it cost Tsumugi every scrap of courage she could muster to get out the words. “I think I must’ve screamed back then because shortly after finding her Gokuhara-kun and you, Harukawa-san, came running into the room...and then the body announcement played.”

Maki nodded slowly as to give her consent to the course of events. “I can confirm that. I heard her scream when I came back from my fight with Momota-kun.”

“Gonta was also searching for Yumeno-san after the pink bear entered his room and Gonta started seeing disturbing things about Yumeno-san. While going to her room after that Gonta heard Shirogane-san screaming.”

It didn’t came as a surprise for him that Gonta had needed a bit of help in actually getting to watch the video. But would the two be willing to tell them what they had seen? He needed at least to try.

“What was in the memories you saw?” Kokichi questioned. “What were the disturbing things you saw about Yumeno-chan Gonta?” **_Trying so desperate to contribute something useful?_**

“Gonta not want to tell. Telling bad things about dead person is not what Gentleman do,” he declared simply. No way too change his mind.

“Shirogane-san?” Maki asked her, obviously going with his question.

“I don’t want to tell either,” Tsumugi exclaimed. “But even after seeing it I don’t think it will make Kiibo-kun a threat for us.”

“What about Iruma-san and Kiibo-kun?” Maki finally asked not quite satisfied with the answers they got from the other two students.

“I haven’t seen them since they went away together yesterday after dinner.”

_Huh? So the two of them had vanished together?_ Could it be that the two of them had planned something? He was still suspicious that Miu wouldn’t do anything awful as revenge after Monokuma had showed her off, spitting out her plans of _his_ death. **_I should’ve let her kill me._** _You’re (I’m) annoying._

He felt a slight tug on his shoulder. “We should head to Saihara-kun’s lab now and then search for the remaining missing students.” He looked up at Maki and simply nodded. On their way to the lab Kokichi brought out his Monopad to write something down.

“What are you doing?” Maki asked.

“I thought it would be best to write down how the actual state of the memory influenced people is,” he answered and showed her the list he made prior.

       Influenced from memory: Kokichi, Kaito, Shuichi(?)

       Not influenced from memory: Maki, Himiko, Tsumugi, Kiibo, Gonta

       Unknown: Miu

Maki hummed only in respond to his list obviously something else bothering her. “So...what was Saihara-kun’s about?”

“Huh?”

“What was his memory about?” Maki asked again.

“Won’t tell you.” Kokichi had no intend to talk about it right now, especially because he was still unsure of what to make of it. As long as he wasn’t able to get more clues considering the true meaning of Shuichi’s memory he thought it best to simply ignore it and keep it for himself. _But what if he is the mastermind? What if I allow him to hurt the others because I didn’t warn them?_ Still, so far it seemed no one had seen the other boy at all. _Nothing to say to that?,_ he commented to himself. **_It would be wonderful if Shuichi could make them suffer._**

Maki paused for a second. “Did you tell him?”

“Hmm,” Kokichi truly had to think about that one. “Not really but...some stupid comment slipped past my mouth when he cornered me and now I’m not sure if it was enough to let him be influenced by it, since Monokuma said only telling the main essence would be enough.”

“Was your meeting with Momota-chan as bad as mine with Saihara-chan?” he decided to ask, breaking the awkward silence that had followed his words.

“You can say that,” Maki agreed, “But I also won’t tell you how his memory turned out...for now.”

“That’s only fair.” Still it irritated him that except Maki mentioning meeting Kaito after watching the memories, she didn’t talk about the astronaut at all. “Are you wondering where he is at the moment? He's also missing, isn’t he? Seems like I’m the only one who was influenced by his memory and hasn’t vanished.”

Maki simply shrugged, but also probably because they had reached their destination standing in front of the lab of the Ultimate Detective. What he definitely hadn’t expected upon Maki opening the door was to be greeted by the detective himself with the words: “You _two_ are investigating together?”

“...” Kokichi was for a moment too stunned to say anything.

“Where have you been?” Maki immediately shouted at him.

“Wandering around the academy,” he answered and tilted his head like he was checking them up. Shuichi definitely looked different.

_Did that mean..? **I will look so good dead.**_

“Aren’t you investigating?” Maki asked curios making a few steps into the room. “Want to join us?”

It happened that Shuichi completely ignored her and instead walked past Maki to clench his fingers painfully around Kokichi’s injured arm. “You hurt your arm? Did you do that to yourself?” He would lie if he didn’t say that Shuichi’s eyes lit up with the thought.

“Ah, stop that!” Kokichi screamed out trying to get his arm out of Shuichi’s tight grip. “It hurts!”

“There's still blood coming through the bandages,” he declared as if he told him something about the weather. Shuichi's fingers kept tracing around the wet blood spots, while all Kokichi could think of at that moment was: _Probably because you’re making the cuts worse again._ _Let go off me. **No!** No one’s asking you (me)!_

“Saihara-kun,” it was Maki’s voice that finally brought some change in Shuichi’s behavior. As if he had burned his fingers he suddenly let go of him and jumped a few steps backwards.

“I-I’m so sorry Ouma-kun! I-I think I should go... Ugh,” Shuichi was holding his head in his hands as if he had a strong migraine.

_No, please no._ Shuichi’s behavior could only mean one thing.

“Saihara-chan are you...are you influenced by your memory?” Kokichi risked asking the taller boy, albeit holding his distance to him and massaging his abused arm.

“I...” he could see the pain and distress in the other boys eyes. Shuichi looked as much conflicted and torn apart inside as Kokichi himself. Does that mean he was also fighting with himself?

What he thought he saw in front of him wouldn’t make quite sense if Shuichi really was the mastermind. But what else could be the meaning of what he had seen in the memory? Or was Shuichi still acting? But...why?

“I...” but then he shook his head and turned around. “I need to go.” And with that Shuichi ran off leaving the two of them behind in his lab. One more confused than the other.

_Maybe he only wanted to check how much of a threat they were,_ a voice inside Kokichi thought. Still the more hopeful but quieter voice remarked that Shuichi could also have run away to protect them from...himself?

“I think we can add Saihara-chan to the influenced persons by now,” Kokichi said dryly.

“Thanks to your slip out,” Maki nodded, “I think you should tell me now.”

“Tell what?” he asked innocent, despite Kokichi being pretty sure what she was aiming at.

Maki who was having none of his shit right now stared angry at Kokichi for playing dumb. “Saihara-kun’s memory. He’s obviously avoiding us.” 

“You sure you want to know?”

“Just tell me, Ouma-kun,” she told him exhausted.

“Fiiine. If you insist!” he stated still trying to drag out the moment. “Well, I saw a memory where he acted like some kind of mastermind and promised to think about the best and most cruel ways to kill us and bring us despair.”

“...You’re lying.” Maki gaze could kill, but only half of him backed down under it. A small victory.

“I wish I would,” was his simply answer. True in more than one way. He desperately wished he could rewind time before they had to watch the damn memories. **_I should have just let Miu kill me._** _Kokichi sighed not quite willing to fight that thought._

The assassin looked at him like he had told her there were flying pigs at the sky. She needed a moment to proceed what he had said, but after all, she got her composure back quite fast. “Why didn’t you say something earlier? If Saihara-kun is really...”

“I don’t know...” Kokichi interrupted her not wanting her to think like that, not wanting himself to think like that. “Something’s not fitting.”

“Because you don’t want it to be that way, right?” It seemed like Maki saw right through him. _Maybe because he’s the only person here I ever considered trusting! **Pathetic.**_

“Believe me you shouldn’t let yourself be put off by personal reasons, if...if it’s for the safety of all of us.”

“...”

“It’s not like...not _only_ like that,” Kokichi finally got out. “I mean some things are just not logical. Like for example why would he show me that memory at all if he really is the mastermind? He could have easily chosen something uncompromising then. This would be no deal for the true mastermind, would it not? ...So why? Also when we met him earlier it looked like he was fighting on the inside, probably with his memory self.”

_Like me. **Like me.**_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While thinking about the murder scenario for my danganronpa fic:  
> *Sits on the bed writing with the back to the door*  
> *Sees movement at the door out of the corner of the eye*  
> *Turns around*  
> *Is greeted with a long knife that is being waved around*  
> *...*  
> ”Do you happen to have a bread knife too? I found a second one in my cupboard.”  
> //Thanks mom
> 
> ~ a now scared Phini


	7. No way out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Ah I’m so sorry...” Shuichi whined. “Oh... Did I really say that out loud?”  
> Again Kokichi was reminded there was something really dangerous about Shuichi’s ‘other’ personality. Still, he seemed to try to fight it exactly like him, a fact that allowed Kokichi to get his hopes up. After all this made Shuichi less likely the true mastermind, even if he had an insane personality they should be wary of.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really love the ‘Investigation duo’ Maki & Kokichi, but I adore the ‘Investigation trio’ ;)  
> I also feel very sorry for what poor Maki has to endure during the whole investigation, being the only sane one willing to help.  
> I suck at investigations and trials but I tried my best.
> 
> I definitely didn't raise the total number of chapters again.  
> ...but that's a lie.  
> I promise this is the last time, I made notes to every chapter and figured they would be rather long and since I don't like editing too long chapter I splitted them...again.

Looking the crammed shelf up and down his eyes sliding over the bottles, each containing the unmistakable picture of a skull on it and a bold black X, he found three empty spots. Judging from the dust rings there was no denying something had been stored there before and only recently taken away.

A short glance over the room confirmed that the missing bottles hadn’t been simply put somewhere else to examine them, no, they definitely had vanished. After finding no trace where the bottles had been taken, he examined the rest of the shelf. Maybe one of the bottles had been opened? But what was left in the shelf was still sealed and full to the top.

_Three bottles missing. **That means two more possible victims.**_

Considering Shuichi had been in the room before they even arrived, Kokichi couldn’t stop the thought that maybe the detective had tampered with the evidence. He could’ve easily taken away the bottles so no one would be able to find out what type of poison had been actually used. Still, even if he hadn’t done _that_ he probably knew by now which poisons the three bottles had hold by only looking up what was still there.

It seemed Maki had the same thoughts as him. “I think we need to ask Saihara-kun which poisons are missing. We won’t find out by only staring at the shelf.”

“Then what should we do first?” Kokichi asked the assassin. “Find Saihara-chan or Iruma-chan and Kii-boy?”

“The last two first,” Maki decided, “Let’s give Saihara-kun a short break to get himself back together. I think maybe the other two are in one of their labs, because I saw them go down there yesterday. They could still be hiding in one of the labs.”

The decision had been made by Maki and so the two were heading down to the inventor’s and robot’s labs which happened to be directly next to each other. Hopefully they would find the other students there or at least some hint where they could have gone. It turned out neither Miu nor Kiibo really intended to hide at all. Upon opening the door to the inventor’s lab, after finding Kiibo’s abandoned, they stumbled across the two students sitting on a table and chatting like nothing had happened outside.

“What are you two doing?” Maki asked with a dangerously low voice. “Having a tea party, while one of our friends had died?”

Kokichi definitely didn’t hide behind Maki and let her start talking with the other two because part of him was afraid of the one in front of them who had wanted to kill him. **_It would be much easier for her now._** Nonetheless he _wasn’t_ hiding, Maki only happened to stand accidentally in between him and the other two.

“Hey Kiibo look who’s there, the little shit had enough guts to come over,” Miu said looking directly at him. Even if her words were as rude as ever something felt off about her. The tone in which she said the words to him made Kokichi want to hide behind Maki even more. It was a cold and calculated one that triggered something inside him that felt related to his memory self.

When Miu suddenly stood up and surrounded Maki, depriving him of his protection, Kokichi felt a wave of panic rising inside him. _Why now? **Can Maki protect me?** Seriously!?_

Finally Miu was way too close to him, facing him with a sadistic smile in her face, provoking his memory self to take over. Kokichi screamed internally when a wave of fear hit him and he could feel the tears forming in the corner of his eyes. That’s why he did the only thing he was capable of at that moment, grabbing the next best thing for support, which so happened to be Maki’s shirt. The inventor only laughed.

“Do you want to d-” Maki began but upon seeing Kokichi’s panicked face she stopped dead never finishing her usual phrase.

“Don’t hurt me, _please_!” Kokichi couldn’t stop his mouth from squeaking.

Maki just sighed and pried his hands softly off of her shirt. “And that makes four.”

Still, even if she had unbound his fingers from her shirt, she took her place again in the line between Kokichi and Miu, to save the former from the inventor’s strange behavior and separate the two.

“Iruma-san,” chimed finally Kiibo in, “Let’s sit down again.”

She didn’t follow Kiibo’s orders at all but also didn’t make another attempt to reach for him, which Kokichi was thankful for. At last his thoughts were clearing again causing him to feel ashamed of his behavior. _Why did Miu have such an impact on me?_ **_I should just do what she wants._** _Certainly not._

Kokichi finally managed to get his memory self back into line, regaining control again over the situation. He took a few steps away from Maki, reversing his invasion in her personal space, still bewildered of what had happened moments ago.

“She’s like that since I told her about her memory,” Kiibo explained, also his eyes stayed somewhat fixated on Kokichi. “What happened to Ouma-kun?” he asked Maki.

“Same,” she only said.

“Do you think you can tell us about Iruma-san’s memory?” Maki asked interested.

“Sure he can!” Miu sounded enthusiastic “Go on, tell them what my memory self did!” _Well she definitely doesn’t want to hide it like the other two._

“I-If you say so,” Kiibo answered, unsure about if it really would be okay to say it out loud, “I saw that she did bully a lot of her classmates, like insulting them, beating them up and...sexually harassing them. She didn’t respond to any begging or pleading and went through with her actions every single time. O-One time she ended up fighting with someone so bad, he hit his head that hard that he died sometime after in the hospital.”

Well that could be an explanation to his strange reaction when the girl had approached him. After all Kokichi past self had always been the bullied one, at mercy of his tormentors. It seemed natural that there would be some kind of relation if the two roles bump into each other.

“What happened when you told her all of that?” Kokichi asked after remembering his own intense reaction.

“Well she...attacked me,” Kiibo said sounding extremely calm despite his words, “but I knocked her out before something more could happen and when she woke up again she seemed to be more...normal.”

“What did she do?” Kokichi couldn’t stop himself from asking, having noticed the short pause before ‘attacked’.

“She didn’t try to-?” Maki seemed to have the same train of thoughts he had, but stopped herself from asking the complete question. Being it out of discomfort or embarrassment.

“I don’t want to talk about it!” Kiibo immediately quashed their attempts, which was followed by a short awkward silence.

“You’re still here after that,” Maki stated.

“Well it seems she has calmed down by now,” Kiibo answered truthfully, “Also I think I can handle her and it’s probably for the best if someone keeps an even closer eye on her after that.”

“That’s probably right,” Maki nodded before turning her head towards the still standing Miu. “What’s with Gokuhara-kun’s memory?”

“Hmpf,” Miu huffed, “That shitty fool’s trying to deceive us with his stupid attitude, despite him being one of the most dangerous contract killer this world has seen. What a shame it must be for him having somehow lost his memory and leaving him as nothing more than a dumb bug loving idiot. Haha~”

Kokichi didn’t thought something could surprise him anymore, but after hearing Miu talking about Gonta he was completely stunned. A dead silence followed Miu’s words, which was hard to break through.

“Kiibo?” Maki finally got her voice back. “Can you please _under every circumstances_ prevent Iruma-san from telling Gokuhara-kun any single word of this?”

“Of course,” Kiibo agreed. “We don’t need more...screwed up and dangerous people.”

_Screwed up and dangerous? **Well I’m definitely screwed up.**_

“Let’s get finally to the important point!” Kokichi suddenly shouted to throttle his inner fight. “Why had you kill Yumeno-san?”

“Yumeno-san is the one who is dead!?” Kiibo looked horrified, while Miu only smiled. “Not much of a loss since I’m still alive. It’s not like that girl was much of use.” It was certainly best to just ignore Miu’s insulting words since no good would come from a fight between them.

“Why didn’t you come to the dormitory when the body discovery announcement played?” Maki wanted to know after the tension had loosened.

“Iruma-san refused to leave the lab,” Kiibo simply explained, “and I really didn’t want to leave her alone after everything that happened.”

“Understandable,” Maki admitted.

“Also the red Monokub, Monotaro, appeared with the files and shoved them into our hands before vanishing again,” Kiibo explained, “That’s why we thought it would be fine if we stay here.”

“Well there’s still a trial coming,” Kokichi announced, “How about investigating? Or do you two already know who the culprit is?”

“How should we?” Kiibo questioned surprised. “Anyway, we wouldn't be of much help though. Saihara-kun is the one that will find the clues.”

“Well...” Maki started giving Kokichi a side glance, “We’re not sure he’s in the... _right condition_ to be a great help. He was also influenced by his memory.”

“Uh, but then...what should we do?” Kiibo reacted shocked.

“Do you two know anything you might want to tell us?” Maki offered trying to start a conversation.

“No,” Kiibo and Miu said simultaneously, a fact that didn’t help to believe their answer at all. Something about the way the two acted felt wrong to Kokichi like they wanted to hide the truth from them. _A lie. **Really?**_

But Kiibo wasn’t done yet: “We don’t know anything that could help to solve the murder.” _A truth. **Really?** I won’t allow myself to doubt me._

“What did you two do the whole night?” Kokichi questioned more firmly now. “Maki Roll said you were here since yesterday evening.”

Miu didn’t answer, instead ignoring Kokichi completely and looking everywhere but to him. When Maki realized Miu’s antics she repeated Kokichi’s question and the inventor finally answered. **_So she won’t answer a nothing like me._**

“Hah!” Miu grinned like the maniac genius she was, “I spend the whole night improving little Kiibo here! We made some necessary changes!”

“Iruma-san!” Kiibo said resolute. He shook slightly his head and the inventor went quiet. What the hell was going on between the two!? Still it was more than obvious they wouldn’t get anything out of the two anymore.

“So you two will just stay here until the class trial begins?” Maki finally said.

“Yes!” Kiibo declared.

“Yes! We’ve still some work to do. Get over here Kiibo!” Miu shouted, her attention already back on the robot and away from them. Kokichi didn’t mind, instead he was rather happy to finally be able to leave Miu’s presence.

They were half thrown out of the lab. Coming out of the inventor’s lab, neither Maki nor Kokichi had an idea where to go next. But before they could discuss their further plans red and purple eyes fell on the black figure standing next to the Shrine of Judgement. After a short silent discussion Kokichi and Maki decided to head over.

“Hey Saihara-kun,” Maki shouted over to him. Despite Kokichi’s first thoughts Shuichi made no attempt to flee and avoid them again, instead he was waiting until they reached him.

“How are you doing?” Kokichi asked. He hoped Shuichi got the true intention behind his question and would decide to bother answering truthfully after fleeing from it the first time.

To his utter delight his beloved detective showed him a warm smile that looked rather normal, which helped calming down his nerves a bit. “It’s quite exhausting fighting that little insane monster inside me. But I think I don’t need to tell you that.”

“Ah, I’m sorry,” Kokichi replied, still feeling guilty about his slip out. He could have spared them a lot of problems if he just had kept his mouth shut.

“You couldn’t know,” Shuichi reassured him, “Neither did I.”

“Turned out Monokuma tricked us really bad this time,” Maki remarked, “How much are you struggling at the moment?”

“It’s getting better,” Shuichi answered, “Just...stay wary around me. Hehe.” **_I should leave._**

“Fine,” Maki nodded, “What should we do next?”

“How about asking Saihara-chan what he knows about the missing poison bottles? As long as he’s in a state to tell us truthfully,” Kokichi commented.

“Hehe...oh I see, so you noticed the missing bottles?” Shuichi grinned. “Well let me think about it.” He held a hand over his mouth in his usual thinking position, somehow seeing him like that felt reassuring.

“Hmm. The first one of the three bottles which were missing was Dabigatran, an anticoagulant, the second bottle had been Botulinum, a neurotoxin, and the third...? Ah I know!” he suddenly shouted and took a small bottle out of his pocket. “It’s that one here, Strychnin!”

“...!” Maki was petrified and so was he. **_I said leave!_**

“Ah, Saihara-chan why did you take _that_ bottle with you!?” Kokichi definitely couldn’t deny the fact that he felt more than a bit unsure about Shuichi having such a dangerous item with him right now.

“Dunno,” he simply answered shrugging “I thought it might be useful for an emergency since everything here is really fucked up.”

“Well including _you,_ ” Maki shouted back, “So would you do me a favor and give that bottle to me?”

With extreme hesitation Shuichi let himself finally being talked into handing the poison bottle over to Maki, pouting slightly. Nonetheless Kokichi felt relieved that the assassin was now in possession of the deathly poison. ... _Oh god_. _If someone would’ve told me that thought yesterday I would’ve doomed them completely insane. **Haha...like I’m now.**_ That only showed how really screwed up everything was.

“Where should we go?” Maki questioned Shuichi after she stored the bottle in a pocket in her skirt.

“The casino,” Shuichi immediately answered.

“Huh?” Kokichi asked, “Why there?”

“Didn’t you notice?” Shuichi wanted to know, looking at them as if it was absolutely clear why going to the casino was a good idea. “When I looked at Yumeno-san’s body...” _When did he even had time to do that!?_ “There was a bit of glitter on her clothes and under the sheet. Not that much, only a few scraps, but visible enough when reflecting the light.”

Well Kokichi didn’t notice and he hated himself for it.

“So?” Maki asked curios.

“Oh!” Kokichi realized what Shuichi wanted to tell them. “In the basement of the casino are often remaining glitter rests on the floor because every time someone wins there’s a glitter fountain coming out of the MonoMonoSlots.”

“This could mean she had been there recently,” Kokichi concluded, “Considering it was on her clothes she probably put on in the morning.”

“Totally right there!” Shuichi said pleased with his deduction and led them over in direction of the entrance to the casino.

Everything could’ve went smooth if it hadn’t been for Kokichi’s sharp mind being too focused on restraining his memory self than to watch out where he was going. When he overlooked a small hole in the grass, which caused him to fell down nearly hitting his head on the grass, Shuichi suddenly started to giggle. He fucking started giggling.

“What the hell are you laughing about?” Kokichi said angry while standing up again.

“Oh, I just remembered how cute you looked with the blood running down your face during the investigation for the third trial!” he announced happily, blushing a slight shade of pink. “You know when you fell through the floorboards!”

“What the-?” Maki wasn’t able to respond properly to _that._

Kokichi only blinked, not quite believing what the other boy had just said right into his face. “Are you being serious?” Not considering he had actually called him cute.

“Ah I’m so sorry...” Shuichi whined. “Oh... Did I really say that out loud?”

Again Kokichi was reminded there was something really dangerous about Shuichi’s ‘other’ personality. Still, he seemed to try to fight it exactly like him, a fact that allowed Kokichi to get his hopes up. After all this made Shuichi less likely the true mastermind, even if he had an insane personality they should be wary of.

“ _Just_ thinking it wouldn’t make it better, Saihara-chan,” Kokichi remarked. ** _He likes it when I’m hurt. He likes the look of blood on me._** Even if it was his memory self speaking it made Kokichi shiver.

The detective just stayed quiet and looked at him with an apologetic expression in his eyes.

Suddenly Maki’s spoke up next to him. “He’s flirting with you.”

“Are you kidding me?”

“Why?” Maki said in a way too serious sounding voice. “He’s never complementing me on my injuries.”

“Are you trying to be funny, Maki Roll?” Kokichi said scowling.

“I can hear you two, you know,” Shuichi growled but didn’t say anything else. He didn’t deny it.

What began as an awkward silence suddenly turned in a collection of laughter, when the three of them realized in just how much of a fucked up and despairing situation they were in. For a short moment Kokichi was nearly feeling normal again, despite his normal self probably would never end up in the company he was in right now.  

He was relieved when they arrived at the casino, heading straight to the basement where they could concentrate on finding clues and not thinking about _other_ things. While everyone was searching another part of the room Kokichi kneeled down on the floor, brushing his fingers over the ground. It didn’t take long for his hand to be covered in glitter, sparkling in all colors. He flinched when he suddenly felt fingers starting to stroke through his hair. He didn’t need to look up to know who it was.

“That looks beautiful,” Shuichi said obviously hinting at his sparkling hand. **_It doesn’t even hurt me._**

“And it’s not even blood,” Kokichi answered, immediately regretting what he said when the grip of the fingers tighten for a moment around the strands of his hair before entirely vanishing.

“Here,” Maki spoke suddenly up, luckily preventing Shuichi from answering. “Isn’t that her hair clip?” Indeed what Maki hold up in the air looked like the blue hair clip Himiko did constantly wear.

“So she was here and that recently,” Kokichi noted, “I thought Monokuma said the Monokubs had to clean up the place at least every two days.”

“Yeah and yesterday at dinner Yumeno-san still had the clip in her hair,” Shuichi said.

They all sighed and headed out of the casino having fulfilled what they had been come for. Kokichi chose to stay at Maki’s side not wanting to be too close to the detective at the moment. Outside again Maki looked rather conflicted. “There was still no announcement for the trial to begin...is there any place left where we should investigate?”

“There’s probably a reason why it hadn’t played yet,” Shuichi told the other two. “Maybe Monokuma waits for a second killing or a second body to be found!”

“What do you mean, Saihara-chan?”

“The trial should’ve already started,” Shuichi continued explaining, “I think there’s a high possibility of a second body we haven’t discovered yet. Is there still someone we haven’t seen since this morning?”

The girl next to Kokichi was frightening quiet. _Too quiet._

He didn’t needed long to think over Shuichi’s words before answering: “The only one I haven’t seen until now is...Momota-chan.” He turned to Maki. “Where did you saw him last when you told him about his memory?”

“You told him his memory?” Shuichi questioned, “What was it about?”

“...”

“Harukawa-san?” Shuichi’s voice was barely a whisper.

“He said he wanted to be famous for killing us all,” was the short summary the assassin gave them very unwillingly.

“Huh!?” The confused sound came of both Shuichi’s and Kokichi’s mouth. Still they shouldn’t be surprised anymore after all the memories they knew about.

“And I saw him last outside the dormitory where we decided to meet,” Maki declared.

“You said he ran off,” Kokichi stated remembering Maki’s words. “In which direction did he go?”

“In direction of the backyard, passing by the terrace of the dining hall.”

“Then we should head that way,” Shuichi decided. “Maybe we find a trace where he could’ve gone.”

Kokichi didn’t know what to feel. His gaze was fixed on the back-entrance door leading to the dining hall. He didn’t want to hold back the tears streaming down his cheeks, because his memory self was completely overwhelmed with the situation. Even when his vision got blurry he could still see the cold glare from the two people standing next to him, no emotion shown in their face at all. _Reversed roles, huh? **I’m the next one.**_

Kokichi reached for Shuichi’s hand, because he was the one next to him, and grabbed it. He didn’t know why himself. He just couldn’t stand himself anymore at that moment, feeling like he would faint right then and there if not for the contact to steady him. Even if Shuichi turned out to be the mastermind Kokichi needed him right now, while he was fighting with himself on the inside. **_I don’t want to play that game anymore._**

Lying on his back in front of the door was Momota Kaito, luminary of the stars, his shirt torn apart revealing a dark blue skin underneath. A cracked and spilled poison bottle next to him.

“That’s-,” Kokichi tried to steady his shaking voice. _...horrible._

But his attempt on speaking was interrupted from the body discovery announcement suddenly playing, not even telling them to gather somewhere this time. Instead the cruel bear himself appeared in front of them.

“Finally!” Monokuma laughed. “I was so bored because you didn’t even try to find the idiot!” He handed them the files and vanished again.

‘Monokuma File #04: The second victim is Momota Kaito, the Ultimate Astronaut. The body had been found around 12:30 p.m. in front of the back-door of the dining hall. Cause of death had been a huge inner blood loss and therefore failure of the organs.’

Directly after finishing reading the file there was a crack initiating another one of Monokuma’s announcements. What did he want to tell them now? Maybe finally ordering the others where the body had been found?

“Alright! It’s time for what you’ve all been waiting for - the class trial! Please assemble in the Shrine of Judgement in the courtyard! Upupu~ See you all there!”

_What the hell!?_

A moment later Monokuma was back, getting immediately shouted down by the three students.

“What-!?”

“What does that mean?” Maki shrieked at the bear. “We didn’t get any time to investigate!”

“Also the others weren’t able to come here!” Shuichi remarked angry.

It was obvious, judging from the red color visible on Monokuma’s face, that the bear was getting more furious for every word shouted at him. “It’s not my fault that you were too dumb to find the body earlier. You three can tell the others what you saw! I’m sick of waiting for you! Hurry over to the Shrine of Judgment! Now!”

**_Will we be able to survive the class trial?_ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Wanted to avoid writing a trial at first*  
> *Inserted insane Shuichi in the story*  
> *Remembered thinking how fucked up all participants would be if the protagonist wouldn’t save them every damn trial*  
> *laughs mischievously*
> 
> Let’s write a trial, Phini!
> 
> Also apologies to all who feared for Kaito-!


	8. Trial of hell 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Ahem. Now then, let’s begin with a basic explanation of the class trial!”
> 
> Shuichi rolled his eyes. “Boring! We’ve heard that already three times before! Let’s get straight to the exciting circumstances of the killings!” _True, but lesser enthusiasm about the murder would be very welcomed Saihara-chan_ , Kokichi thought.

Being pursued by a furious and frightening Monokuma, the three students had no other option than to head down to the Shrine of Judgement as fast as they could. Opening the red door and stumbling into the room they found themselves next to all of the other students. No one looked up when they entered, instead they had formed an odd circle around something, completely focused on whatever it was. Upon coming closer to the ‘something’ it turned out to be an unconscious Miu.

“What happened to her?” Maki asked out of curiosity.

“I had to knock her out,” Kiibo told them. “She was about to say something _inappropriate_ to Gokuhara-kun.”

“Ah...” Kokichi mused quietly. Kiibo didn’t need to say anything else, they already knew what he meant with inappropriate.

Saying so, one of the present one's wasn’t happy about the unconscious Miu. “What do you bastards think you did? How is she supposed to participate in the class trial just now?” Monokuma let out a deep sigh and looked over to Kiibo. “Just get her down in the courtroom and throw her on her podium. It won’t make much a difference though if she is awake or not, recalling the past trials.”

“I-It’s Momota-kun isn’t it?” Tsumugi spoke up, when Monokuma went silent. Meanwhile Kiibo was trying to lift up Miu. “We didn’t even get there! Why weren’t we allowed to investigate? How should we hold a trial like this?”

After a short note from mostly Maki to the others about what happened to Kaito and how they had found him lying on the terrace of the dining hall, the passage to the elevator behind the waterfall finally opened up for them. They didn’t waste much time and walked over, Kiibo carrying Miu with his best abilities.

_I need to observe every reaction, every anomaly that could hint to the true mastermind. Something is off about all of these and maybe we will be able to get a hint throughout the class trial. I’m afraid about what might happen. **I might die.**_

Entering the trial grounds brought them to a courtroom which looked more like an old ruin than anything else. Kokichi didn’t know what to make of the look. It appeared broken?

“Isn’t it cool?” Monokuma said with a grin. “Just a slight reference to your wrecked up memories from the past.”

After saying this the bear slipped in his usual throne seat above them, his remaining two Monokubs finally showing up too. While Monokuma attempted to start with his usual introduction the two Monokubs were jumping excitedly up and down, well Monotaro more than Monophanie.

“Ahem. Now then, let’s begin with a basic explanation of the class trial!”

Shuichi rolled his eyes. “Boring! We’ve heard that already three times before! Let’s get straight to the exciting circumstances of the killings!” _True, but lesser enthusiasm about the murder would be very welcomed Saihara-chan_ , Kokichi thought.

“Shut up!” Monokuma shouted angry at Shuichi, threatening him with one of his paws, sharp claws visible. “I’m the fuckin’ moderator of this class trial and I can say in my introduction what I want to say and when I want to say it!”

“Right on bastard, father has the word here!” Monotaro immediately chimed in.

“That’s so gross,” Monophanie murmured.

“During the trial you’ll present your arguments for who the culprit is, and vote for ‘whodunnit’.” A short cough from Shuichi. “Vote correctly, and only the blackened will be punished. But if you pick the wrong person... I’ll punish everyone _besides_ the blackened...”

“Wouldn’t that be exciting?” It seemed to Kokichi the circumstances of the trial had pushed Shuichi’s other half more in the foreground, like it had been with him when he met Miu’s bully self. “All of us executed at once? Do you even have a worthy scenario planned out if that would gonna happen? I mean it needs to be really-”

_Is he really fantasizing about getting us all executed? **No way out of that trial anymore.**_

Maki interrupted Shuichi, stopping his rambling. “Can someone knock him out too, please?”

“I would agree with that,” Monokuma said. “But let us go on...as I said before, I’ll punish everyone _besides_ the blackened, and that person will graduate from this academy! Make sure you vote if you don’t want to die! Now let’s start this awesome trial already!”

“Yeah father is right!” Monotaro screamed. “Wait, we did that before-?”

“Uhh, and the executions were so cruel every time!” Monophanie whined looking sick.

“Wait what executions-?”

“Just begin already!” Monokuma interrupted their chatter.

“I have a question before we begin the trial,” Kokichi said, getting only an annoyed “Spit it out!” from Monokuma.

“Well,” he started, “we have two victims again, right? So is it like in the third class trial where we only needed to find the culprit who killed the first victim?”

“Yeah it is,” Monokuma answered bored, “Just determine the culprit who killed first!”

“B-But which one died first?” Tsumugi looked horrified, her voice getting higher by the end of her sentence. “How should we find out?”

He had to admit the cosplayer wasn’t wrong, with how few they truly know he couldn’t come to a conclusion at the moment. “Best would be if we reconstruct first what happened this morning,” Kokichi remarked.

“You’re right,” Maki gave him credit.  

“Saihara-kun what do you think-?” started Kiibo hoping for the detectives support but he paused when there was no response at all, instead the other boy looked rather bored.

“Huh? Oh, I don’t think anything,” Shuichi finally answered. “Instead I’m sooo exhilarated how you'll try to find out the true culprit by yourself! I’m good with just watching you suffering while trying to get your brains working.”

_So much for help from the detective. What happened to him? He seems ten times worse than during our investigation time. **Just give up already. Why do I even try? I can’t stand against them.**_

His gaze shot up again while he was hearing a shaking voice coming out of the detective’s mouth. “...I-I will try.” At least he hasn’t given up fighting.

“Then let’s start with the earliest happenings this morning!” Kiibo said overcoming his surprise over Shuichi’s behavior. Since when was the robot so forward? “When did everyone awake this morning?”

“I can’t tell when I awoke I didn’t took a look at the clock,” Kokichi sighed. How stupid had he been? “Still it must’ve been rather early since when I left the room in a hurry I didn’t see a hint that someone else had already come out.”

“And the morning announcement didn’t play at all-?” he recalled, obviously the emergency power had been still active at that time. When did the regular power system even started working again? “The first thing I heard over the monitors was the body discovery announcement. Does...someone know when the power system had been repaired?”

“The power system sprung back to life around 8:30 a.m.” Maki told them rationally, “At that time I was heading out of my room to meet with Momota-kun to discuss the memories. “When I got into the dormitory lobby I wondered about the bright white light that suddenly came up instead of the dim green one.”

“I can say I watched the memory around the same time since the light in my room changed when I finished it. I really needed to compose myself after this before finally getting enough confidence to go and search for Kiibo-kun and then Yumeno-san. It must’ve been a quarter of an hour after I watched the video when I got myself to go out of the room,” Tsumugi remembered, “And when I f-found Yumeno-san it must’ve been a few minutes past 9 a.m.”

“Gonta only searching for Yumeno-san after seeing those bad things, then Shirogane-san screamed and Gonta ran over,” the big guy told them.

“Iruma-san and I were working the whole night in her lab but in the morning around 8 a.m. both Monokubs showed up and told me I needed to go into my own lab. What I did. I was locked in and therefore forced to watch the memory. After that the door opened up again and I went back to Iruma-san’s lab,” Kiibo told them about his view of events.

“Ngh...” A strange sound was coming from Miu’s podium. True to it the inventor slowly regained consciousness and tried standing up from the floor, looking irritated around.

“Any word to Gokuhara-kun and I will knock you out again,” Kiibo was quick to tell her before she even could open her mouth once.

“I don’t take any orders! I do what I want,” Miu yelled at him. Even if Miu's anger wasn’t directed at him, Kokichi just winced at her rough voice, his memory self trying even more to hide because of her. **_Leave!_**

Kiibo just sighed. “So then whats your alibi?”

“Alibi?” Kiibo looked like he was tired of her behavior, not quite a surprise after so long of being stuck together with her.

“Ah, you know perfectly well that we where together the whole night, babe!” Miu shouted.

“That sounded...wrong,” Kiibo realized.

“What’s with you Saihara-kun? You haven’t said anything. What did you do after Ouma-kun ran off?” Maki asked the detective.

“I told you already,” Shuichi simply answered.

Maki shook her head, looking at him in disbelieve that this was the normally so timid detective, whose only intention had ever been to help them as much as he could. “Wandering around the academy is not an alibi.”

“I-I was in my lab...” Shuichi said a bit stuttering. An antic Kokichi figured that told them the normal Shuichi was in control for once. He obviously attempted to say more but no further words came out of his mouth.

“That’s obvious, because we found you there,” Maki remarked. For once Shuichi looked more troubled than bored as if he wanted to tell them more with what he was saying. But Kokichi couldn’t grasp it with how few Shuichi only managed to get out.

“That hadn’t made anything clearer, had it not?” Tsumugi looked ready to freak out and start crying. “W-What now? My plain self has truly no idea where to start.”

“Gonta don’t know too. Don’t know why again friends had to die.”

“Sucks to be them,” Miu spat out laughing, no regret shown in her eyes about the way she spoke about the dead students.

_Could this go any more horrible? **I want the pain to end.**_

In this moment he felt really terrible, never had Kokichi thought he would be in so much despair during a trial. In how it went at the moment all they would achieve would be exactly what Shuichi wanted, an execution of them all, since no one seemed to be able to lead the trial like he had done the times before. _It would’ve been best if nothing of this had ever happened..._ “I should’ve just let it happen the way it was destined to be.” **_True._**

“Huh?” he heard Maki’s voice. She didn’t seem to have understand his sentence because of how quiet he said it.

“If everything would’ve happened like Iruma-chan planned it than I would be dead by now and Saihara-chan could figure the whole plan out during the trial, resulting in Iruma-chan’s execution and everyone else would be happy,” Kokichi explained in a cold voice even he was surprised of.

“Don’t say that...” He heard a sad voice. What confused him most was the fact that it had been Shuichi saying it.

“So it’s better to have Yumeno-san and Momota-kun dead? And probably someone else because there’s still a culprit we can’t figure out!?” Maki shouted at him.

Shuichi shook his head. “...I don’t want anyone t-t... I want to save... No! Ahaha.” in a second they could see his face changing from a sad look into the boring one he had shown them at the beginning of the trial.

“This is really frightened,” Tsumugi said meaning Shuichi’s behavior. “Is this because of the memories?”

“Yes...” Maki answered.

“So who had been influenced by it?” Tsumugi asked. “Saihara-kun for sure...and Ouma-kun?” _I don’t want to hear it said out loud, it makes it even worse. **So pathetic.**_

“And I bitch!” Miu screamed as answer.

“To make this faster here’s an actual list Ouma-kun wrote during the investigation,” Maki told them and showed the notes Kokichi had made prior.

 

       Influenced from memory: Kokichi, Kaito, Shuichi, Miu

       Not influenced from memory: Maki, Himiko, Tsumugi, Kiibo, Gonta

 

“I see,” Tsumugi nodded. “That explains why Iruma-san’s even more insufferable than normal.”

“Not that there’s so much of a difference,” Kiibo muttered.

“Friends had also bad memories like Yumeno-san?” Gonta asked trying to understand what was happening.

“Yeah, maybe we should talk about the memories,” Tsumugi remarked. “I mean, we...we should know what happened to the others. What we have to deal with from now on.” Her words were followed by a dead silence, no one willing to tell her. It was Maki who finally took responsibility and started to explain: “Okay if everyone’s so eager to tell, I will give a short over view.” All of them were staring at her by now, some with a cold glare, but she continued nonetheless.

“First let me mention the one I think won’t cause us much trouble, namely Ouma-kun, since his memory made him more self-hating and miserable, but not someone who might be a threat.” Even if he didn’t like Maki words at all, he had to admit they weren’t wrong. _And again I ended up as the pitied one. I-I feel so ashamed of **what had become of me.**_

“Second, Momota-kun’s memory isn’t really...necessary to tell about anymore but it showed that he liked the thought of getting famous for killing others. And Miu seemed to be one of the worst bullies, not even caring if her victim will stay alive after beaten up or not. ...Saihara-kun...” Shuichi just looked at her without saying anything. “...well he’s obviously obsessed with murder and violence.”

Again another gloomy silence spread between the students. No one seemed to know what to say to that.

“...friends not bad! They would never do that,” Gonta immediately denied Maki’s words.

“Well...” Maki started.

“What s-should we do?” Tsumugi said afraid, hiding her face behind her arms. “Even if we survive the trial, they wouldn’t go back to normal, or? How could we live around them? Not knowing when they would go completely insane?”

“I can’t give you an appropriate answer but I think we have more urgent problems right now,” Maki shrugged.

“Can we please go finally over to the murder schemes?” Shuichi lamented, “Or don’t you want to find the killers?”

“Let’s...let’s start with Yumeno-san then,” Maki decided. “What do we know about her?”

“The Monokuma file said she had been suffocated,” Kiibo remembered. “But there were no strangulation marks.”

Kokichi just stared at what was happening between the others, trying to fight the urge to run away. “I found a label from a poison bottle next to her bed. Judging from what Saihara-chan told us there were _two_ bottles missing from his lab. One of them happened to be Botulinum, which can cause respiratory paralysis.”

“So that little bitch was poisoned?” Miu wanted to know. “Isn’t it then obvious that Shithara did it?”

“Everyone could’ve grabbed the poison bottles,” Tsumugi reminded her.

Maki was next to try and get Shuichi out of suspicion, at least it stayed a try, since she didn’t consider his insane memory self not willing to play along. “Saihara-kun how long have you been in your lab before we met you there?”

Like every normal being Kokichi thought Shuichi would probably defend himself by now but he hadn’t expected a casual: “Can’t remember. Minutes, an hour...I dunno.”

“How the fuck can’t you remember that!?” Miu asked, while Shuichi just shrugged at her words.

“So to get this right, someone sneaked into Yumeno-san’s room after her door was unlocked again and poisoned her, but who had the possibility too?” Kiibo wanted to know, still trying to adjust to Shuichi’s new personality. “Iruma-san and I can back up each other the whole morning. I immediately went back to her lab after watching the video, way before Shirogane-san found Yumeno-san.”

“Maybe you were working together the whole time then! Hah! I love plot twists were the obvious innocent turn out to be the culprits!”

“...Monotaro were not meant to participate in that trial too,” Monophanie explained with a calm voice.

“Fuck! ...There’s a trial?”

“Back to topic!” Monokuma interrupted them again. “And shut up you two!”

“...Besides us two I think no one else has a noteworthy alibi, right?” Kiibo went on as if nothing had happened.

“But if Shirogane-san was the whole time, after seeing the video, in the dormitory trying to get to Kiibo-kun and Yumeno-san she would’ve seen if someone else was there. This means Yumeno-san’s death must’ve been before Shirogane-san went out of her room,” Kiibo concluded.

“I saw the memory and must’ve left around 8:45 a.m. to search for them,” Tsumugi recalled.

“So that means Yumeno-san was killed before 8:45?” Kokichi asked, trying to think who would be able to do this at that time.

“Obvious,” Miu just snorted.

“But I don’t think she was murdered in her dorm room,” Maki spoke up remembering their investigation results but had hoped Shuichi would actually tell them about the clues they found. But Shuichi wasn't saying anything at all.

“W-Why had you think that?” Tsumugi asked confused.

“Actually it was Saihara-chan who mentioned it...” Kokichi said. Still, no reaction from Shuichi. He sighed. “But Yumeno-chan had glitter on her clothes which could only be from the fountains, when you play on the MonoMonoSlots and win. This means she must’ve been at the casino at some time. So we went to look for any clues there and we found her blue hair pin on the ground. Also she still had it the day prior at dinner, which leads us to the thought that she had been there in the morning.” _Trying to be **useful for once, huh?**_

“So she could’ve been killed in the casino? But why was she there in the first place? Maybe she was there yesterday after dinner?” Kiibo remarked.

“That’s a possibility but we should consider she might’ve run away before being killed. Maybe she tried to hide in the casino,” Maki answered him.

“I see that would be a possibly,” Tsumugi nodded slowly. “So you think she noticed what happened and ran away from whoever tried to harm her?”

“Or she tried to hide from you,” Maki bluntly stated.

“From plain me? Why!?” Tsumugi looked shocked at the assassin.

“She saw your memory, did she not?” Maki told her the obvious. “We don’t know what exactly she had seen. It might’ve frightened her into running away.”

“M-Maybe,” Tsumugi admitted, “But I don’t know either!”

“Luckily,” Maki just said. “I think I wouldn’t stand the trial as the only sane person if all of you had been influenced by your memories.”

“Maybe she tried to hide from me because of my memory, I can’t say,” Tsumugi looked thoughtfully, “But someone must’ve brought her back to her dorm, since I found her there.”

Kiibo thought a moment over her words. “True. But it could also mean she had been poisoned in the casino and brought back while she was already dead.”

“Do friends think there was one culprit?” Gonta suddenly asked.

Maki nodded at those words, still looking not completely convinced. “We should consider that. After all it seemed there had been a similar cause of death.”

“What do you mean?” Kiibo questioned her. “Monokuma didn’t give us time to get there after the body discovery announcement. So we don’t know what exactly happened to Momota-kun, all we have is the Monokuma File to look upon and the brief explanation you gave us before we went down here. Monokuma only told us to wait for you guys to explain.”

“Yeah, the file only said the idiot had bled to death!” Miu recalled.

“Well we found Momota-kun at the terrace of the dining hall,” Maki remembered, closing her eyes like she was in pain. “H-His shirt was torn apart and his stomach was completely painted a dark blue. There was a cracked bottle next to his body, probably poison too...”

“Yes...” Kokichi continued, gazing at Maki in concern. “...and it would fit to what Saihara-chan told us about the second missing bottle. Because it was Dabigatran, given to someone in a high concentration the victim will bleed inside and probably die from that.”

“Is there any hint when he died? After all we found the body pretty late,” Kiibo wanted to know, getting back to the main topic which was to figure out who had been the first victim.

“Yeah you did!” Monokuma shouted furious at them. “I tried to stay patient and waited but not unless the detective finally said something did you even consider searching for the idiot.”

That’s true...why didn’t we look for Kaito earlier? Because Maki dodged every attempt in speaking or thinking about him. Kokichi didn’t like the direction of that thought.

“Still, there was never a hint when he died. After all we can only tell it must’ve been after he left from the meeting with Maki,” Kiibo slowly said.

“How did that meeting go?” Shuichi asked. It was strange seeing him for once truly interfering in an argument.

“She killed the poor idiot probably!” Miu cackled.

“I... We promised to meet outside of the dormitory after we watched the memories. So I headed out as soon as possible but it seemed Momota-kun had woken up earlier than I and was already waiting outside. Then...I started to tell him what I’ve seen...and afterwards he got really strange and attacked me. I dodged him and pushed him down. When he stood up he looked at me and ran off towards the backyard,” Maki told them, shaking at the memory of what had happened.

Thinking about Maki's statement and considering what everyone else had told about someone hearing their memory Kokichi came to a conclusion. “It seems the memories had the worst impact on us directly after hearing them.” _Well I tried to hurt... **kill myself.**_

“Of course they have!” Monokuma laughed, looking pleased that he finally figured that one out. “What do you think? The plan was that everyone should’ve been told about their memory and then run amok. Maybe it was a mistake to let you bastards watch them on your own and let you also decide to tell the others on your own conditions. ...I think it would've been better to put two of you in a room, show you the video and then let you kill each other happily...fuck. Maybe next time.”

“In the moments after recalling the memory your memory self will have complete control over you, while over time your other self will regain more power again,” Monophanie explained rather helpful, “Isn’t father clever to come up with such a smart motive?”

“...But it will never go away completely even if you think you’re back in control! Ahaha~!” Monokuma maniacally smiled at them. “And there are triggers which will make the fight worse again!”

Everyone was stunned by Monokuma’s words. At least that explained a few things, but Kokichi wasn’t happy to hear them. He also didn’t know if they had reached an achievement in the class trial at all. Even after trying to get the events from the morning together none of them was any wiser about what had truly happened.

“That means both of them had been poisoned?” Tsumugi finally broke the silence.

“Well looks bad for you Shithara!” Miu laughed at him. “You don’t even have an alibi since the shota left you!”

There was so much in Kokichi's head he couldn’t stop the headache which was already forming. If it wasn’t for the parasite inside him to drain all his energy out of his body, Kokichi was sure he normally would’ve figured it all out by now. But as tiered of everything as he was his mind stayed blank. _Just try thinking about the clues we gathered so far. I need to try harder. **Why? I’m good for nothing. I can’t even connect simple clues anymore.**_ His vision was getting blurry, not because of tears but because of the darkness creeping up in his mind.

_The poison bottles from Shuichi’s lab._

_..._

_“I-I was in my lab_...”, _“Minutes, an hour...I dunno.”_

_He immediately knew which poisons were missing._

_He had even one with him in that moment._

_They matched the cause of both deaths so perfectly._

_..._

_He also knew there was a second victim._

_He wasn’t surprised to find Kaito’s body. Not even half of him._

_He had seen Himiko’s body but no one recalls when he could have been there._

_..._

_Shuichi has no alibi_


	9. Trial of hell 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Fiiine!” Monokuma said annoyed. “Then fuckin’ hurry! I already waited long enough during your investigation time!”
> 
> “A-Actually it’s a question for Saihara-chan,” he announced, slightly afraid of the other boy’s reaction, or if he would get any at all.
> 
> “Good luck!” Miu snored.

_The poison bottles from Shuichi’s lab._

_..._

_“I-I was in my lab_...”, _“Minutes, an hour...I dunno.”_

_He immediately knew which poisons were missing._

_He had even one with him in that moment._

_They matched the cause of both deaths so perfectly._

_..._

_He also knew there was a second victim._

_He wasn’t surprised to find Kaito’s body. Not even half of him._

_He had seen Himiko’s body but no one recalls when he could have been there._

_..._

_Shuichi has no alibi_

_..._

_Simply poisoning someone is just too obvious._

_This isn’t a notably and gruesome murder like he promised in his memory._

_That’s why... I don’t believe... **I don’t want to...**_

_..._

Kokichi opened his mouth to question the unreadable detective about an important thought that had itself implanted in his head, but before he could do so Tsumugi’s trembling voice prevented it. “Pl-Please, Saihara-kun you didn’t do it right? Just t-tell us why you couldn’t have done it!”

The worst of all things that could happen, did happen right before his eyes. Without bothering to give them the desperately needed answer, Shuichi just started laughing like he had gone insane.

“Saihara-kun!” Maki pleaded, not trying to say anything else to him. She looked more distressed and hurt than Kokichi had ever seen her before. Thinking back he truly had never seen her in any state related to the actual one. Even during their investigation she had seemed so composed the whole time, a part he too was normally good in, just not now. What was happening to her? While observing the laughing Shuichi, Maki’s body grew more and more tense and if looking closer she also started to shake lightly, her expression one of pain. Kokichi couldn’t say how much Maki’s open and readable behavior was irritating him, foreshadowing something terrible.

“Saihara-kun?” Now it seemed to be Kiibo’s turn to try to get the detective to answer them. “It would be nice if you at least could say anything to the accusation.”

“Pah!” Miu spat out. “Why do you all need him to say it out loud for you? It’s obvious he did it! He already told that he fuckin' wanted us all to die! But _I_ was too much of a genius and ruined his plan in figuring out all the spicy details! No way it wasn’t him!”

... _wanted us all to die_...

The words repeated over and over in Kokichi’s mind. Something about them felt wrong to him, also regarding Miu’s accusation. If anything the words were fueling the odd feeling he felt getting stronger inside him. While Kokichi was locked in his thoughts, the others still tried to convince Shuichi to admit what he did, the detective only laughing harder in response.

“It seems there’s nothing more to say to that!” Kiibo told them looking unsatisfied because of Shuichi’s denial to speak. “So...let’s just vote and get it over with.”

“Right!” Miu shouted, confident that her statement finally fruits in their minds. “It’s clear the insane idiot did it and because he was stupid enough to kill both with the same method we don’t even need to know who of them had been killed first!”

Monokuma looked down at them surprised shown in his face. “You want to vote then?” He looked in the affirmative faces and started: “Well then its voting tiii-”

Two students of the small circle of remaining participants didn’t think this would be a good idea and started to interrupt Monokuma. Kokichi happened to be a few seconds faster than Maki, who also had attempted to speak up, so it was his voice that cut through Monokuma’s call.

“No!” he shouted, every eye now on him, “Stop! We’re not finished yet! I still have questions to ask!” Kokichi indeed had, but up until now every time he wanted to speak someone of the others had stolen the moment. Actually it was only one question bothering him, because finally he had realized an important detail concerning the whole events. Going over all information they had gathered so far and thinking about the odd feeling he had, he came to a conclusion himself and it wasn’t the same Miu had come up with. **_Don’t get involved._**

“Fiiine!” Monokuma said annoyed. “Then fuckin’ hurry! I already waited long enough during your investigation time!”

“A-Actually it’s a question for Saihara-chan,” he announced, slightly afraid of the other boy’s reaction, or if he would get any at all.

“Good luck!” Miu snored.

At least Shuichi finally stopped his creepy laughing and looked at him with an expectant expression, a glint in his eyes that made Kokichi feel really uncomfortable and nearly kept him from speaking again. “I-I... Saihara-chan? Did you put the poison bottle and the label there...next to the victims? If you had used them you wouldn’t be so stupid to leave evidence behind. So why?”

The others stared at him, their eyes making Kokichi want to hide, trying to understand the subliminal suggestion of his question and what this would’ve meant for them if they truly had voted already.

For Kokichi, considering their achievement so far, it all leaded to the same result. He didn’t believe for one second that Shuichi was the murderer, probably not in both cases. Not while he didn’t want to believe it but while the evidence seemed to speak more against him participating in the murders than proving his guilt. Still, _what_ he believed was that the other boy had tampered with the crime scenes, creating new evidence which would lead them to wrong conclusions. _He’s play **ing with us.**_

Shuichi stared at him, then he blinked and began to smile. “Maybe.”

Upon hearing the word leaving Shuichi’s mouth everyone stood there frozen on their podiums, looking terrified. He could see the same thought in their eyes. They could’ve already voted if he had Miu and Monokuma let go on with it, which means they would’ve voted wrong...

“Why would you do that!?” he couldn’t stop himself from screaming at the detective. “Do you want to get us all executed?”

“Well-” Shuichi started but was interrupted by Kokichi, who had remembered the beginning of the trial. _This trial **of hell**. _ “Just...don’t answer actually.”

But now that he was found out, Shuichi seemed more than happy to explain his actions to them. “It would have been way too easy if not for a little distraction! What would’ve been the point of this class trial if everything was clear from the beginning. I mean come on!  Now it’s obvious what happened, at least for the counting death!”

When Shuichi spoke the next sentence, hearing his shaking voice, Kokichi immediately knew that he was still fighting and his normal personality was winning for once. “I-I wanted to tell but that class trial makes it really hard for m-me. It’s like it t-triggers the other me.”

“Saihara-chan...” Kokichi said sadly. He did know too well how Shuichi must feel. _It’s like with me and **Miu**._

Finally the other students seemed to awaken from their petrified state. It was Kiibo who reacted first to what had just happened. “Easy?” he nearly screamed. “We still don’t know who was killed first and who killed the first victim or even the second! What is so easy about it?”

Kiibo’s angered voice send a cold shiver trough Kokichi’s body, causing a dark feeling in him to rise up. A hunch that had been there for quite a long time, neatly packed and stored away so he wouldn’t have to deal with it. Now in the worst moment ever it was getting back to him making his blood grew cold. By any means this...this couldn’t be true...

_Haha...thinking like that...yesterday it wouldn’t have bothered me at all. **A lie.** True, but I wouldn’t have showed it. _

A gasp from Shuichi made him turn around to face the detective again. His eyes were half lidded and he seemed in pain but somehow Kokichi got the feeling that whatever Shuichi was trying to accomplish would save the damn trial. It turns out he was right and he didn’t like it one bit.

“I-I...” Shuichi started holding a hand against his head. “I saw Yumeno-san running to the casino after f-finding Momota-kun’s dead body.”

 _What!?_ Does this mean Shuichi had been present during the murders? Had he also seen who did it? And it seems his other personality didn’t want us to know about it. **_We’re only dispensable game figure for him in this killing game._**

“So,” Maki’s voice was ice-cold when she spoke up, “Momota-kun was the first to die?”

“Yes.”

“I see.”

“Finally something we can work with!” Tsumugi said. “Now we need to figure out who killed Momota-kun!”

“You don’t need to.”

Kokichi couldn’t stop his whole body from starting to shake. Maki’s voice was so composed, only a hint of sadness showing through, but for him it was the end. The last hours with her came crushing back. The last hours he had spent with a person he would’ve never though he would learn to like in a million years. That’s why her next words shattered his last hopes of a better ending for them all in little pieces.

“It was me. I’m the culprit. If Yumeno-san truly was still alive at that point then I killed Momota-kun earlier.”

Opposite to her words every weakness she had shown before was gone now, all Kokichi could see in Maki’s face was determination to save them by delivering them the identity of the true culprit and a small glint of pain from the still lingering memory.

_// “Believe me you shouldn’t let yourself be put off by personal reasons, if...if it’s for the safety of all of us.”//_

He closed his eyes. He closed his overworking mind. Why had this to happen? Kokichi would lie to himself if he didn’t say somewhere in his mind the painful possibility had been there since Maki told him about her meeting with Kaito and the fact that she never cared for his well-being throughout the whole investigation. _Of course not_ , she had already known what happened to him.

Before, he never spared Maki a second thought than to be careful around her, and now? How much could change in one day? He would give anything to stop the outcome of this trial. _To stop_... His chest tightened at the thought. _Did he really think of Maki as a friend now?_ _Or was it the will of his memory self clinging on his protector?_ _Or... **both?**_

“No.” _that can’t be true. **Why?**_

“True.” They all looked over to Shuichi, who had reacted to Kokichi’s denial.

“You knew that from the beginning!?” Tsumugi shouted at him, her face red from anger. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“What would be the fun of that?” Shuichi answered, obviously gone back to his insane personality. “Also if it helps I don’t know _for sure_ who killed Yumeno-san.” For a moment Kokichi thought he saw Tsumugi’s anger at Shuichi even rising higher before she sighed and looked away from the detective.

“Why Maki-?” Kiibo just looked at her, a sad expression in his face as if he couldn’t believe himself what was happening.

Finally there was a reaction in the assassin’s blank face. She broke down, clinging to her podium until her knuckles turned white. It was the second time at this terrible day that she let her mask crack. **_Mine is long gone._** The whole day she had tried holding back what was welling inside her.

_// “I hope your happy now brat! This will be the last moment for a long time!”//_

Kokichi would have never thought something coming out of Monokuma’s mouth could turn out so true.

“You have no idea,” she started eyes staring blindly at her fingers. “...how it feels...” She couldn’t hold back her tears anymore. “I-I can’t...Momota-kun...Kaito...” Seeing Maki so shattered hurt him more then he would ever admit.

“YOU ALL HAVE NO IDEA HOW...” she screamed, more water and salt streaming down her cheeks falling to the ground with a quiet sound. “...how terrible it feels if someone you like that much starts trying to kill you. If-If I hadn’t stopped him he would’ve hurt me and every one of you too. I needed to stop him b-but despite his illness he was still rather strong...a-and then during the fight I hit him in the s-side of his stomach so he...so he would finally let go of me. I-I didn’t mean to but I think I must’ve ruptured his spleen, w-which caused such a massive blood loss... I could’ve simply knocked him out b-but he was grabbing my throat so tightly, I felt dizzy and I needed to get him off...I-I didn’t quite think about where I hit him...I should’ve known better...I should’ve been able to handle it better than this...He didn’t have to die...”

At that point Maki’s composure had completely melted away, her regretful figure sitting on the ground crying. “...I should’ve stopped him with s-simply knocking him out... He...he means so much to me, him being the first one to ever treat me as a likeable person...I-I’ve never felt so much for a person before...I...and I was the o-one...” Whatever Maki said after that was too quiet and muffled through her sobs to understand.

_That’s ju **st cruel**. _

Nonetheless Shuichi had obviously heard something he wanted to know more about. “Illness?” he asked but with a shaken voice. Seemed at least Maki’s breakdown had an impact on his inner fight, favoring the normal Shuichi.

“D-Do you remember that he d-didn’t train that much with us anymore and k-kept coughing...I a-asked him about it since he didn’t say a-anything to us. I-It turned out he had awful coughing fits, d-during which he...he also t-throw up blood. He didn’t know more about t-this illness himself b-but his body kept steadily turning weaker...”

 _That’s horrible,_ Kokichi thought, _but I already guessed that something was wrong with the astronaut._

“It’s only fair i-if I got executed,” Maki finally said, doing her best to ignore the tears still streaming down her face.

“Finally!” Monokuma interrupted the horrible moment of utter despair. “It’s voting time! Let’s make your decisions!”

“Who’ll be chosen as the blackened!? Will you make the right choice or the dreadfully wrong one!?” After a short moment of silence, where Kokichi nearly had a breakdown himself while pressing on Maki’s button, the bear continued: “Well, I think I don’t need to tell you that you all voted correctly! The blackened who killed Momota Kaito is the Ultimate Assassin, Harukawa Maki!”

_NO! **NO!**_

“And now the moment you’ve all been waiting for! Punishment Time! I have a special punishment prepared for the Ultimate Assassin, Harukawa Maki!”

_// GAME OVER - Harukawa Maki has been found guilty. Time for the punishment!_

_The Shadow-chasing, Ultimate Assassin, Harukawa Maki’s Execution. //_

_NO! **NO!**_

Kokichi was unable to move his body when a metal claw closed around Maki’s throat pulling her into the next room. The room’s entrance still wide open the place wasn’t far enough away from them to not see what would happen to Maki. The dim and gloomy light in the round room was tiring to look at, but Kokichi couldn’t avert his eyes from the horrible scenario playing out before him.

_What could he do? **Nothing.**_

Shadows were creeping over the ground of the room, barely visible due to lack of brightness at all. To Kokichi it looked like a black, flat monster who tried to chase Maki, who in contrary was trying desperately to avoid the threats. Even if Maki didn’t know at that point why, it was obvious to see that this was what would hold the danger to her life. But not only the shadows were haunting her, halfway during Maki’s escape from the shadows the square-formed floor tiles began to crack and vanished into a void underneath, leaving back only black holes. It grew more and more difficult for Maki to avoid stumbling into one of the shadows or fall down one of the holes. It happened when she accidentally stepped with one foot into a shadow that she found out about their secret. 

A bunch of thin and long silver shining needles had been visible for a second, impaling Maki’s leg before retreating again, leaving her stumbling and bleeding. From there on it was harder to avoid the shadows at all, adding even more wounds to Maki’s already damaged legs. Despite the obvious pain she must feel she didn’t cry out once.

Kokichi felt someone starting to get restless next to him but he was too focused on Maki to care about it right now. _There had to be a way to save her! I should’ve helped her...but I can’t. **I’m weak.**_ He was too mortified to do anything and even if not Monokuma would only let them die both. He would never allow someone to get away without execution.

Slowly Maki’s ability to dodge the opening holes lessened. She barely avoided falling to her death for now the second time in a row, when Kokichi felt a sudden movement next to him. Before he could register that it was Gonta running across the courtroom, the tall boy had already reached the passage into the other room.

He heard Gonta screaming: “No! Harukawa-san only wanted to protect herself and everyone. No murderer!” combined with Monokuma’s angry voice: “Stop that! Get back or you can die with her! Upupu~”

It was too late. Gonta had already reached Maki, wrapping his arms around her and prevented the two from falling for real with his movement. Still the drift away from the hole brought them both in an upcoming shadow. The needles broke through Gonta’s left side, also touching Maki in the process. Looking at the blood streaming down both figures, Kokichi knew the next step would kill both of them.

_I need to do something... I have an idea. **I’ll only make it worse.**_

His mouth took action before his mind could really process what he was doing, namely screaming at Monokuma for an interruption. In hindsight this didn’t seemed like a good idea anymore, since he would only postpone Maki’s execution and also doom someone else to die. Why did he do it? All he could think of in that moment was to get more time...but for what? **_Idiot._**

“Stop!” Kokichi shouted in his attempt to save them. “This isn’t fair! I won’t accept only Maki as the blackened!” _Not a good idea,_ he told himself, _you will kill even more people. But I need to stall time. **Stop it.**_ For all it was worth the movement in the other room came to a hold for a moment, allowing Maki and Gonta to take a short break from trying to survive.

“You already voted and correct, there’s no way back!” Monokuma said threatening him. “And if he wants to die with her who am I to deny his wish?”

“She didn’t kill Yumeno-chan, even if Momota-chan died earlier I think every culprit should be revealed. I won’t accept the decision if not both culprits are punished!” Kokichi told the bear, still feeling he only would make things worse. He couldn’t tell what it was that was pushing his actions this way.

Something he also hadn’t dream of happening was that his demand would be backed up by Shuichi. “Well he isn’t wrong. Why a time rule? Wouldn’t it be better we need to get both culprits right and then they would be executed together? Both culprits should be honored for their work.”

_Honored!? Well back to insane Shuichi. At least he is helping, **somewhat**._

“This isn’t for you to decide!” Monokuma replied. “I told you beforehand what would happen and what was required from you in this trial!”

“I demand another trial for Yumeno-chan’s murder!” Kokichi shouted again at the bear, his eyes never leaving the pair in the next room. “That’s what this killing game is about, is it not? To kill and get away with it. What...suspense would all of it hold if one can get away with murder without a trial?” He stopped not quite willing to say the next sentence, but it had to be done. “What would be the e-excitement of a killing game without a class trial? Who would want to...see that?” And there it was again his presumption of a possible audience, a guess to which Monokuma had already reacted earlier in the killing game.

“He’s right! What would be the fun of a killing mystery if no one needs to find the complete truth?” Shuichi agreed. It felt nice having his help but Shuichi’s choice of words made Kokichi shiver. “I mean after the next killing...” Kokichi winced hearing those words coming out of Shuichi’s mouth. “...all remaining students can just walk around and kill each other without being made responsible for it? Only while you think none other than the first one matters?”

“Shut up you two!” Monokuma screamed, really _really_ angry by now. “There’s no place for discussion! I’m the headmaster!”

“So you want to suppress the possibility to entertain because you’re stubborn?” Kokichi got himself to say against his better judgement.

“God I knew it!” Shuichi interrupted him, staring at Monokuma with fire in his eyes. “You’re so boring! That’s just like a little child who doesn’t want to admit that it was wrong! How pathetic! I should’ve been the mastermind of this killing game, than it would’ve been really exciting and not like that dreary shit you’re only able to stage.”

“...” For once Monokuma was at a loss of words, just looking at Shuichi like deciding right then and there if the boy should die a terrible dead through one of his Exisal’s. After a painful silence Monokuma gave in.

“Fiiine. If you’re so desperate to have a class trial for each murder I will grant you that!”

 _He really accepted?_ Even if he didn’t know what would be the outcome of the second class trial Kokichi was still happy to have delayed Maki’s death, not wanting to think that in the same time they also had doomed someone else to die. Still he knew, without Shuichi’s _questionable_ help his plan wouldn’t have worked at all.

Kokichi put the dark thoughts aside for once and concentrated on how happy he felt when Maki and Gonta finally were allowed to leave the room. Both of them were looking equally exhausted, blood streaming over their bodies, but the best of it: they were still alive.

“You have a day before the class trial for Yumeno-san’s killing starts,” Monokuma told them. “Until then the execution of Harukawa-san will be postponed, but definitely not retreated. She will be executed with the second culprit by tomorrow or alongside you all if you guess wrong!”

“And now get your ugly visages finally out of view!” Monokuma said and after a short farewell from the Monokub’s the three bears vanished from the courtroom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...well I've to admit the first version of the trial had another outcome but Gonta decided to change it...because I just couldn't O.O
> 
> Also here's the explanation why I decided only to show Kokichi's point of view till the trial, because the other idiot already know most of the things that happened during the memorable morning...


	10. Little insane monster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He felt a strong impulse to follow the other boy, interested in where he was going and why. He had looked so vulnerable and fragile under him with the traces of tears staining his pale cheeks. Shuichi had never seen the supreme leader like this before. What would he give to look at that awesome face more often and how sweet it would be to be the reason for Kokichi’s tears, which made his cheeks glitter like ice even in the dim room light.
> 
>  
> 
> _Wait...what am I thinking?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This should've first been an extra chapter at the end of the story but my mind wanted to write it now ;D
> 
> I also clearly failed my goal of a short story having around 15.000 - 20.000 words xD

“Please! You’re acting weird! I’m sorry I didn’t mean to...but please tell me what’s happening.”

Shuichi’s knew it hadn’t been the best of an idea to press the shorter boy against the wall and even slap him on the cheek, but when Kokichi suddenly started crying and simultaneously gained a look in his eyes that just screamed that the owner was tired of living, he didn’t know how to handle the situation properly. The short leader didn’t respond to any of Shuichi’s attempts in getting him to speak to him. All of this was so out of character for Kokichi that Shuichi was at a complete loss for what to do. The actions he finally decided on weren’t the best, but after all he got his reaction.

“No! J-Just kill me already!” Kokichi squirmed under his arms. “It’s not like you didn’t plan our awful deaths beforehand!”

This got Shuichi stunned and extremely worried. _What is he talking about...or better what did he see?_ “What are you talking about?”

“You planned all of that! You’re insane!” the other boy shouted. Being confronted with the panic in Kokichi’s face Shuichi stumbled backwards confused over what was going on, giving the shorter boy enough space to run away. _What happened to Kokichi?_

He felt a strong impulse to follow the other boy, interested in where he was going and why. He had looked so vulnerable and fragile under him with the traces of tears staining his pale cheeks. Shuichi had never seen the supreme leader like this before. What would he give to look at that awesome face more often and how sweet it would be to be the reason for Kokichi’s tears, which made his cheeks glitter like ice even in the dim room light.

_Wait...what am I thinking?_

Shuichi felt like someone had dunked him into a black pool of poison, sinking deeper into its embrace with every second passing. Darkness was clashing over his head, stealing him every possibility to breathe normally. He tried to break free from the devastating grip, but failed to get the darkness inside him under control.

**_I should follow him. I should be the one to make him feel even more despair than he already showed after hearing his memory._ **

Shuichi’s feet went out on their own, leading the way through the lobby of the dormitory. Nobody else was there to witness him when he passed the entrance doors.

**_Where did you go, Kokichi? I need to find you._ **

Upon exiting the dormitory and stepping out onto the path between the grass filled areas Shuichi’s eyes immediately scanned his environment for the whereabouts of the shorter boy.

While searching for a glimpse of white which would tell him where Kokichi went, he saw him for a second before the leader could slip out of his reach and vanishing behind the entrance doors of the academy. **_There you go._** Shuichi smiled to himself and followed suit. **_No need to run away! I will find you wherever you may hide!_** Slowly he approached also the main door and opened it only wide enough for him to slip trough. Out of the corner of his eye he registered a movement to his left and chose therefore the path towards the dining hall.

**_Ah Kokichi...I have so many ideas what I could do to you, so I will see that lovely face of yours again._** Since the short leader had shown such a vulnerable and pathetic side of himself Shuichi felt addicted to and captured by it.

His thoughts were spinning around many ideas popping up in his mind about possible ways to treat Kokichi if he would catch him.

Like, locking the shorter boy into one of the rooms starving him and then, after some time had gone by, he could hand him poisoned food to eat. Of course he would tell him so it would be completely up to the leader to eat it or not. Would he choose to starve or kill himself with the poisoned food? And would it count as suicide since Kokichi had taken it willingly or would he be framed as the blackened for setting it up?

Or what would happen if he gave Kokichi some poison and talked him into jumping from the building. **_Not that he seemed to mind that much. And if not maybe a bit of torture might help._** So a fast working poison and a falling body what would kill him first? Could someone even tell in the end? Well those were only the first ideas coming to his mind, evolving in even more complicated scenarios with every thought that crossed his mind.

Being completely occupied by his thoughts Shuichi ended up standing at the beginning of the hallway leading to the dining hall with no idea where Kokichi had gone. The boy couldn’t have gone too far, that’s why the detective decided to check every room nearby, in which Kokichi may have gone to hide away for reasons unknown to him.

Shuichi began his search starting with the dining hall. At least he was sure Kokichi hadn’t left this floor and was still somewhere around, since it was only in the last minutes that he had been so locked up in his thoughts that he didn’t notice where exactly the boy went.

He opened the door to the dining hall carefully only to be greeted by two muffled voices talking to each other. He couldn’t quite make out the exact words spoken but it was obvious none of the voices belonged to Kokichi. The sounds came from the outside terrace of the dining hall, but besides them he didn’t hear anything else which let him assume that the short leader wasn’t in here.

Part of him wanted to abandon the source of the noise in favor of continuing his search for the purple-haired boy, whose beautiful crying face stained with pain wouldn’t get out of his mind. Still another part of him was also curios about what happened in front of the dining hall backdoor.

It turned out the want to get Kokichi was stronger, so Shuichi stumbled backwards about to go back to the hallway and continue his search in the warehouse and store, until the voices from the outside suddenly rose in volume. This got his attention and gave him the strength to suppress his obsession over the short boy for a moment, instead walking towards the noise to get a better hearing at what was said. Now he could finally determine the voices as the ones from Maki and Kaito.

“Don’t look at me like that! Even if the damn bear only wants to fuck with us, we need to speak with each other openly! Only if we believe in us we can overcome his tricks. I’ve seen your memory and I don’t believe the slightest bit of it.

For sure that damn bear used some loophole to make us thinking it would be true, so we would mistrust each other as result. But I think the best way now would be to tell each other what we two saw and then go back to find the others and prevent that someone will act stupid while falling for Monokuma’s lies,” Kaito shouted, clear to understand to Shuichi, while Maki’s following answer was calmer and sometimes difficult to hear. “...such an idiot. But if...insist...tell you about your memory and...you can tell me mine. Not that I care.”

Shuichi felt nausea rising inside him, because there still was him underneath all the darkness who knew what this would mean for his two friends. He wanted to prevent it from happening...again. Shuichi struggled against the dark monster inside him in his attempt to storm out and tell his friends that they, under any circumstances, shouldn’t tell each other about the memory. He wasn’t exactly sure what had happened to Kokichi and him but judging from how he felt at the moment and how the supreme leader reacted he assumed the worst.

Sadly he was still helpless and his insane personality still stronger than him. So his body just stayed in place while following the conversation with mild interest exited about what would happen next.

Feeling trapped and weak Shuichi wanted to cry but there was no physical reaction to his wish, only to the other one inside him who made his body smile sadistically. **_Hopefully this will hold more action than my short interaction with and fruitless search for Kokichi._**

“I’m not...if you...like what I’ve...tell you,” he again heard Maki’s quiet voice speak up.

“Just start already, Maki Roll!” Kaito answered her, “I’m curious about what the bear had come up with!”

_I-I...need to stop the... **Hehe, how sweet. It’s so much more fun to find out how they will react after being confronted with the dark parts of themselves!** I...you’re...no part...of me. **Liar...Maybe one of them will get such a lovely attitude like Kokichi? Or they will simply start to kill each other!**_

“Well,” Maki’s voice cut through his thoughts, loud enough to being understand clearly now. “It was quite stupid. The memory showed you as a ruthless loner who seemed to find his life goal in wanting to become really famous. But not with any kind of boring talent... In the memory you seemed to know what awaits us here and you wanted to achieve your famous status and getting us out of your way through killing us.” She had gone quieter with every word spoken, steadily losing her determination to tell Kaito the truth. And while Shuichi froze in fear his other part just started laughing internally.

**_Interesting. Seems we get to the funny part now!_ ** _No...Maki might be in dang... **Shut up and listen!**_

There was a moment of silence until Kaito suddenly started to laugh. Judging from Maki’s lack of response concerning Kaito’s outburst she seemed to wait for him to cool down before discussing the matter further. When the laughter finally started to subside, she was quick to ask for her memory in return and if it was as stupid as his. Probably an attempt to get out of the awkward situation, but instead of an explanation she was met with more laughter from Kaito.

**_And it starts!_** _Let me g..._ He needed to help Maki! If it was true what she had told Kaito and if it was true that this would now influence his way of acting and thinking like it had been with him and Kokichi, Maki was in great danger. He tried to regain control over his muscles to get through the door and to the couple, but all he could achieve was getting his thoughts swallowed by pitch black darkness, losing every connection to reality for a few seconds and as result leaving the insane monster in control.

**_Uh! This will end badly! Hopefully with some bloodshed._** He felt his thoughts drifting away for a moment. **_By the way I think pink stains would look good onto that pale skin of the short leader._** _Ugh...t-that’s gross...what am I thinking?_ Also he didn’t need to ask why his memory personality was so fixated on Kokichi. The picture of the crying and desperate boy kept popping up in his thoughts every once in a while never leaving completely.

Shuichi felt a glimpse of hope finding out that for the first time since being told about his memory he was able to get a complete and clear thought through the darkness that trapped him in his own body. But on the other hand it had also started being difficult to divide what belonged to him and what to the poison the memory had implanted in his mind.

A loud crack brought his thoughts back to the happenings outside the dining hall and away from his silent fight for control. Had a fight started between his friends while he wasn’t paying attention? Shuichi listened again following the moving shadows through the dirty window to find out what was happening. Also Maki’s sudden yelp did help him catch up on what he had missed in between. “W-What are you doing!? Just stop, this isn’t funny!”

He had never heard Maki with such shaking voice before or even seen her losing her cool once. But now she seemed totally out of her composed and distant role. He would cry if he could. _Maki...I...help... **I’m not part of this. Just let them have their fun!**_

Kaito didn’t say much during the fight or react in any way to Maki’s pleading words. All Shuichi could make out was that the tall astronaut was constantly trying to approach her and get his hands around her throat. _No!_ Shuichi internally screamed but there was nothing he could do since his memory self wouldn’t let him. Despite his constant tries he wasn’t able to control his limbs, when he attempted to stand up his other half got him back down holding him in place. His body felt suddenly too heavy to get up again, due to the dark poison running through his veins.

_Ugh...stop...let me..._ His inner fight died down, because the part of him that wanted so desperate to help Maki was consumed from the darkness leaving him no space for further thoughts and in the same time making him blind for his surroundings. When Shuichi was able again to get another grasp at what was happening, a loud noise alerted him followed by a cry from Kaito.

He could make out a shadow running away from the terrace to the right side of the building in direction of the backyard, while another one was lying in front of the backdoor, barely moving. It took a few more minutes for the figure to completely stop squirming and another few minutes for Shuichi to finally open the backdoor and look upon the scene in front of him.

He wasn’t sure if he had been able to move his body on his own or only due to the fact that the little monster also wanted to know what had happened on the outside. Nonetheless he was finally able to reach for the handle and push it down to open the door. What greeted him on the other side of the door caused half of him to fall into the feeling of immense pain seeing his best friend lying dead before him on the ground, while the other half was busy inspecting the victim for clues how Maki managed to kill him so quick. _Why can’t I even cry? **Beautiful** **his stomach is completely blood stuffed.**_

Kaito had a painful expression in his face, proving that his last minutes must have been rather terrible. Looking at his stomach which was shown partly under the ripped shirt, the detective had to admit that the skin truly had an unhealthy dark color, shimmering in a dark violet. The color was probably caused by the amount of blood which had somehow found its way in his friend’s belly.

Obviously Kaito had suffered from an inner rupture on one of his organs during the fight, maybe a spot being hit to hard. Considering the amount of blood and the quickness in which the injury had drained his life away it could have been a ruptured spleen or aorta. Taking into account that it had happened from a blunt hit Shuichi guessed the spleen opportunity to be more possible.

_Kaito...no... **How boring! Every single one of them will be able to figure out what happened in a second, it’s too obvious...hmm...but what if they got confused with new evidence? There should be a suitable poison in my lab.** What? **The trial will be no challenge at all if I leave it like that. I should do something about it.** No! I-I won’t let you (me) tamper with the evidence! **Hehe try! It’s not that I won’t do it anyway. But maybe you’re right and I shouldn’t interfere in that boring murder. I already wasted so much time on this and I still need to find my beautiful victim.** Leave him alone! **So the poison bottle then?** Ugh... _

Shuichi found out that the mixed thoughts in his head made him extremely dizzy and confused. Also it was quite the strange feeling to do such an intense discussion with yourself. He felt like he had suddenly developed schizophrenia, with one of his personalities a little stronger than the other. Well that wasn’t that far from the truth.

He desperately searched for a way to win but even if he started to slowly feel more conscious in his own body again Shuichi’s normal self wasn’t strong enough to overpower the insane monster. All he felt capable of was leading the thoughts already there in a specific direction. That’s why he needed to chose.

Focusing on the poison bottles he allowed his body to turn to the direction of his lab, guarantee that Kokichi wasn’t the main thought in his head anymore and save him from being torture or maybe killed. _I would never... **Hehe.**_

Before he closed the backdoor behind him he saw a figure running towards the entrance of the casino and love hotel area. Taking their appearance in, which was red hair and a short stature, he concluded it must be Himiko. She kept looking in every direction until she finally reached the door and hide behind. Shuichi just turned around and made his way to his lab. There was no time to waste on thinking about Himiko’s behavior since he didn’t know when someone would find Kaito’s body and his plan would go to waste. **_I should bring some more poison bottles in advance._** The picture of Himiko popped up in his mind. _What!?_

Shuichi hurried through the hallways to the floor where his lab was. On his way there he shot a short look through one of the windows facing the courtyard only to see a confused looking Tsumugi on the path between the dormitory and the main building. She looked somewhat lost, obviously not knowing what to do next. Still he had no time to waste. So he abandoned finding out what the cosplayer was up to and sprinted the last way towards his lab. Upon entering he immediately faced the shelf with the poisons. Searching through it he took six different bottles covering up the most possible deaths including the one he needed for Kaito. Shuichi stored them in a bag he found in one of the drawers before heading back in a fast pace.

He only slowed down when he reached the backdoor again. Making sure no one was nearby he opened the door and went to work. After another glance that truly no one was in range to see him or hear something he smashed the bottle next to the victim on the ground. Making sure he wouldn’t be hit by any glass shades, he eyed his work. He had decided for Kaito on dabigatran, which was normally used as medicine, but in the high concentration it was stored in the bottle from his lab it could be easily used to kill.

Shortly after smashing the bottle Shuichi heard a feminine voice scream. Anxiety someone could have seen bubbled up but a short observation told him otherwise. Thinking it through, the scream had come from the dormitories.

When Shuichi registered a movement to his right he hid in the shadows behind one of the tables. It turned out to be Maki who hurried over but stopped when she saw no one was where she had left Kaito’s body. Her face showed a confused expression. She closed her eyes for a moment before she walked further to the dormitory, obviously trying to find out where the scream had come from.

After Maki vanished in the dormitory entrance Shuichi got out of his hiding spot, a noise claiming his attention. He saw that the monitor inside the dining hall had sprung to life showing him Monokuma’s body discovery announcement. _Wait when did the power system start to work again?_ True to it the light had been back to normal and Shuichi completely failed noticing it. He must’ve been too occupied with himself.

Again fear took over his being. _Kaito’s body hadn’t been seen by three or more people by now, so that’s means... **Yeah! Another one! How exciting! Hopefully not as lame as this one, but when I need to spice it up too!**_

Shuichi felt utterly terrified by himself. This morning had gone darker and darker with every minute that passed. He couldn’t deny that Monokuma’s motive this time had been a full success in every way possible. _Why does this have to happen?_

He wanted so badly to just hide in a corner and cry but his other self wouldn’t let that happen anytime soon. _Why am I so weak? **I’m not weak.**_

_What did Monokuma do to us? The memories were obviously the trigger of this. **This morning had gotten so interesting! I’m happy I can finally intervene!**_

Shuichi attempted to go over to the dormitory to find out if there too was a killing he needed to make a little more difficult when he heard a sound coming from the hallway. Being curios he headed over and sneaked into the hallway only to see Kokichi walking at the end of it. **_So he had been hiding nearby!_** Obviously the body discovery announcement had driven him out of his spot.

Shuichi decided to follow the shorter boy but staying behind so he wouldn’t get noticed. **_Damn he was so close! Sadly Maki and Kaito disturbed me. But now I can use my ideas partly on the already existing victims. Funny I had no role in all of this._** _T-That’s just terrible to think of._

He stopped when Kokichi hesitated to go in the dormitory and instead stood there at the entrance observing what happened inside. Shuichi rounded the dormitory and when he was back at the entrance, Maki was standing there with Kokichi, shouting at the boy to her feet.

He took advantage that both of them were completely focused on each other and slipped carefully through the door. When he saw Tsumugi and Gonta standing on the balcony in front of an open door, which happened to be Himiko’s, he hid in the shadows of the balcony to prevent himself from being seen. _Himiko... **That was to be expected.**_

Fortunately Tsumugi and Gonta went down the staircase not showing any sign that they had seen him. The two of them seemed to look for Maki, where she had gone and what was taking her so long. Showing both their back’s to Shuichi he took the opportunity and headed as fast as he could without making a noise upstairs and slipped into Himiko’s room.

The short mage was just lying in her bed like she was sleeping, still her blue lips and the absent breathing told otherwise. He went closer to observe her body for anything that could have caused her asphyxiation. Even if there were no strangulation marks visible, the culprit could have covered her mouth and nose with something to prevent the much needed oxygen from getting inside her body.

Shuichi lifted the sheet during his examination to find something glittering on her clothing, making in his head the connection between the casino and Himiko. He chose one of the poison bottles fitting Himiko’s cause of death and tried to peal of the label, getting it halfway off before letting it simply fall to the ground and putting the bottle back into his back.

While being fully focused on the victim he nearly missed the voices coming nearer to his location. Quickly he looked over the room in search for a hiding spot. His decision fell on the closet, which would provide him enough space. Hopefully no one of the others would want to look in there. Just when he closed the doors loosely he could hear footsteps entering the room. The voices he heard talking belonged mostly to Maki and Kokichi until Monokuma showed up and gave them the Monokuma File. **_Oh hopefully he won’t..._**

A sudden poke in his side made him jump. All he could manage in that moment was preventing himself from screaming and therefore giving away his hideout position. Looking to his right he was met with Monophanie standing next to him and handing the Monokuma File over. Luckily she just gave it to him and vanished again without saying anything at all.

He read the file while waiting for the voices to die down in the room. When he was finally sure the room would be empty he got out of the closet and back into the lobby of the dormitory. It seemed the others had gathered in front of the dormitory, so he wasn’t able to go out easily. Like before Shuichi waited until everyone had been gathered around Gonta, oblivious to their environment, so he could sneak out and walk away from them as fast as possible.

Shuichi first needed to go back to his lab to get himself rid of the remaining poison bottles. Upon reaching it he put the bottles back into the shelf besides the one he had pealed the label off and the one he decided to keep for safety. The one with the destroyed label disappeared in his desk. After that the detective planted himself in his armchair waiting for someone to show up and asking for the missing poison bottles.

He didn’t need to wait long before two different figures came into his lab. _Maki and Kokichi! **I should be surprised seeing them together, right? Since I**_ **totally _haven’t seen them before._**

While making small talk and being asked where he had been his gaze fell on the blood stained bandages around Kokichi’s arm. _What happened to him? Did he get hurt? **He probably did that to himself from the look of it.**_

In hindsight Shuichi couldn’t really tell how he got that close to the shorter boy and why his fingers were tightly grasping around his arm. It sure wasn’t a good idea judging from the pain stained expression in Kokichi’s eyes. It took a sharp remark from Maki to let him slip back into reality causing Shuichi to jump back and let go of the other boy. _What have I done!? **He’s just so irresistible with that despairing look of his.**_

In favor of shutting up his memory self he decided to put some distance between Kokichi and himself for now, leaving the lab in a hurry.

 

* * *

 

**_Boring. How long will they be in there?_ **

He waited for Maki and Kokichi to leave the inventor’s lab after finishing their interrogation. The detective guessed they hadn’t gotten the hint visible on Himiko’s body leading them to the casino, so he wanted to present it to them.

Nonetheless the first topic that came up after reuniting were the missing poison bottles, to which Shuichi gave a truthfully answer, at least about which ones were missing. After being scolded for keeping a poison with himself he handed the bottle over to Maki. **_I should have kept it._** _Good I handed it over._

It seemed to be a victory for her and also for him, since his memory self wasn’t fond of giving away his emergency defense, or how he called it, but Shuichi had enough control over his body again to act against his other personalities will. It felt good not to be so helpless anymore.

Still even if he felt like he had finally regained some sort of control over the little monster his abilities were still limited. He tried to tell them all that happened in the morning and all he had seen, but was only able to give them the hint to go to the casino. After telling his findings he didn’t need long to convince them to accompany him to the casino.

On the way to the casino Kokichi stumbled and fell to the ground, immediately causing a picture to pop up in his mind. Shuichi saw the same boy in his memory when he had been lying on the floor his head covered in blood and pretended to be dead. It turned out he wasn’t but the wound had still been real and Kokichi had gotten it for falling through the floor because of a sawn through floorboard.

Shuichi’s mind sprung to how the other boy’s face had looked with the small strains of pink flooding down his forehead and cheeks. **_Cute._** _No he had been seriously injured!_ He couldn’t help but feel hatred towards himself due to the feelings that were rising inside him.

Therefore it was even more unbelievable how the three of them ended up laughing after Maki made fun of the whole situation. Still it felt more like gallows humor.

 

* * *

 

Shuichi couldn’t tell how relieved he felt after finally being able to leave the trial grounds. Upon the start of the class trial he had felt the same like directly after being told his memory, meaning swaying helpless in the tight grip of the insane monster that his memory self was.

He had tried to get at least the most important clues over to his friends but it had been a tiring fight, one he nearly lost. Still the final outcome of the class trial wasn’t too bad, since the detective had by now a good idea who the killer of Yumeno Himiko could be. If it turned out true they might have a chance to finally end this hell. _End this with as many survivors as possible. **Well I would prefer the fun to continue but not under such dreary circumstances. Maybe I can replace the mastermind?** No! I will end this game! **Hmph. Fine.**_

Upon going out of the elevator Maki collapsed to the ground being immediately catched and carried by Gonta, who seemed to be in a better shape than her. The assassin’s eyes were still red but she wasn’t crying anymore nor did she show any other emotion at all.

“Hey Gonta can you bring Harukawa-san to her dorm room so she can rest? And maybe stay with her? I think she shouldn’t be alone right now,” Kokichi said next to him. Gonta just nodded and ran with a still silent Maki as fast as he could with his injured side to the dormitory. 

“I will also look after them,” Tsumugi smiled and started to follow the two figures. “My plain self wouldn’t be very helpful anyway.”

While Shuichi had been concentrated on Maki, Gonta and Tsumugi, Kiibo and Miu had tried to sneak off to their labs without being noticed by them. **_What do they hide?_**

“Hey!” he shouted, meeting Miu’s angry gaze.

“Shut up!” Miu answered. “Kiibo-kun and I have important matters to discuss!”

“Shouldn’t we discuss them together?” Shuichi couldn’t stop himself from asking. “I mean we can’t let the class trial go to waste tomorrow.”

“Exactly, that’s why Kiibo-kun and I are discussion things _alone,_ ” Miu said with determination in her voice

“It’s probably for the best,” Kiibo sighed and followed her over to their labs.

_Of course they don’t trust us. For all they know one of us could be the mastermind. **For all we know one of them could be the mastermind. So none of us knows who the mastermind is resul** ting in every one suspecting every one huh?_

When Miu and Kiibo had finally vanished from their view Shuichi turned around to look at the only other still present person. Kokichi looked throughout afraid having the full attention of the detective on him. Still he seemed to gather all his confidence to talk to him: “F-Feeling better detective?”

“Much.” Shuichi answered trying to reassure the frightened boy that the monster inside him was currently not in full control. “Down there...,” he paused trying to find the right words to describe what he had felt. “...I don’t know upon entering the courtroom my memory self had become ten times stronger than before, that was...horrible.”

“So no more I want you all executed?” Kokichi looked at him quizzically.

“Eh, not that much anymore...but it’s not gone it’s just repressed,” Shuichi said not wanting to lie to Kokichi.

“I think I know how you felt. It’s the same with me when...when Iruma-san gets too close to me,” Kokichi told him.

“Because of her memory self?”

“Probably.”

“O-Ouma-kun,” Shuichi started with a nervous look on his face. “Actually would you...want to discuss the class trial which awaits us tomorrow with...me? Because since what happened down there today I’m not sure I will be of much help tomorrow. It depends on how much I want to expose the mastermind when being back to...this insane me.” **_This stupid person earns to be exposed!_**

“I-I completely understand if you don’t want to,” Shuichi said after the tense silence between them had lasted a bit too long. “I can only promise to you that at the moment I feel stable and I can try to warn you if something...something unexpected happens.”

“Fine,” Kokichi finally said. “But no touching my arm. And not causing any injury intentionally to me.” **_Shame._**

“Got it,” Shuichi nodded. “But...”

“Definitely no ‘but’ here!” Kokichi shouted taking a step away from him.

“I could kiss it better then.” _Why did I say this!? **Hm, tasting his blood.**_

“...”

“Ah, my thoughts are so messed up,” he immediately tried to justify his words, to not freak out to poor boy even more. “It’s like my normal self and the memory self are starting to merge.” It really felt like that despite both personalities being that far away from each other that no one could predict how a combination would turn out in the end. _If I stay like this...how should I live like this!?_

Kokichi just stared at him.

He followed Kokichi who first wanted to check on Maki. The assassin had been fallen asleep due to her being exhausted from the day and her wounds, while Gonta was sitting next to the bed watching over her. Tsumugi had also claimed a chair at the end of Maki’s bed spending her time reading a book from the library.

After that both boys searched for an empty classroom to discuss matters.

Shuichi had never seen the assassin so down, only a shadow of herself, but was it truly a surprise after all she had been put trough in the last hours? Kokichi himself seemed deep in thought, sitting on a table and swinging his feet, until he suddenly looked up breaking the silence.

“Saihara-chan?”

“Hmm?”

“What do you want at the moment?” he asked him. “I mean, during the trial you hold back nearly every evidence you had. Am I right? ...Is there something we didn’t figure out? Or can’t you still tell me.” **_So he figured I didn’t tell them the important things, besi_** _des my little slip outs._

“I can now I think,” Shuichi explained slowly, “Interestingly my memory self also wants to reveal the mastermind. It seems for once we’re on the same side...”

“I... _it_...thinks the mastermind really messed up and should therefore be punished for not providing an interesting killing game? Make the mastermind feel despair? If that makes any sense at all... I know all of this sounds ridiculous but I’m actually happy about it since that means lesser exhausting inner struggle for me.”

“It must’ve been really hard during the trial,” Kokichi acknowledged.

“Yeah,” he told him, “Still I tried to give you some hints.”

“Figured.”

“But back to the topic,” Shuichi decided, “You asked about retained clues, well to tell the truth there are a lot. I have some things in my mind that bother me.”

“Let me hear them then,” Kokichi said.

“One question first,” Shuichi spoke mysteriously. “Who do you think is the mastermind?”


	11. A mistake too much

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ... What if she had been working on the memory videos at that time? And the one she was currently working on before I disturbed her being Yumeno-san’s. Meaning due to me startling her Yumeno-san’s video wasn’t completely edited and erased of any possible hint to the mastermind. Maybe she had to die because she saw too much... T-That makes me somewhat r-responsible for her death, does it not?” The last sentence came out really forced making Kokichi feel bad for the other boy.

Seeing the malicious glint in the detective’s eyes slowly vanishing for every step said boy took away from the trial grounds, Kokichi felt relieve wash over him. But at the same time his hope was rising that Shuichi would change to a more acceptable version of himself now his trigger was removed, he too couldn’t help the fear growing inside him when he acknowledged that steadily everyone went off in different directions leaving him alone with the unpredictable boy. _Maybe I should go and look after Maki too. **Going away from him**.  _

Kokichi didn’t bother to follow the conversation between Miu and Shuichi at all, before being finally left alone with the latter, who happened to focus now on the short boy remaining with him in the Shrine of Judgement. It didn’t take Kokichi too long before he couldn’t stand the intense gaze of the detective anymore and he decided to lighten up the mood. “F-Feeling better detective?”

Fortunately Shuichi’s reaction was as normal as it could possibly get in their actual situation, turning out to be just an explanation to what happened with him during the class trial. The reassuring words from the other boy helped to calm down Kokichi’s nerves at least to some degree. What he didn’t expect though was the sudden question from Shuichi to share and discuss their former investigation results.

Although Kokichi wasn’t fond of being alone with Shuichi for longer than needed, he on the other hand couldn’t decline the offer, since it had become more than obvious that the other boy knew much more than he had told them.

In addition the remark about Shuichi’s memory self personality caused Kokichi trouble. If it was true and Shuichi couldn’t control himself in a class trial there may be a desperate need for someone else to know what the detective already knew and take the initiative where he couldn’t. Especially when his memory self would decide to change plans halfway through the trial just for the fun of it. Still he didn’t thought he was the best choice in becoming this person. **_Why me?_**

Could he really trust the boy in front of him? Right before any of this had happened he would’ve doomed Shuichi the most trustworthy person he had ever met. But now? Kokichi wasn’t sure what he should tell the detective as answer to his question.

The threat of Shuichi’s second personality still lingering, which for some reason had grown way too addicted to him, he all the same knew about the need in hearing him out. **_What if he is the threat himself, the mastermind of this game?_**

Even after all shifty words and malicious actions the detective had shown up until now after seeing his memory, Kokichi deep down never really believed the other boy could truly be the mastermind. Was is because he didn’t want him to be it or was it more than that?

_// “You’re so boring! Just like a little child who doesn’t want to admit that it was wrong! How pathetic! **I should’ve been the mastermind of that game** , than it would’ve been really exciting and not like that dreary shit you’re only able to stage.” //_

Shuichi’s statement at the end of the class trial. Sure it could have been a trick, but what for? It definitely wasn’t the case that anybody trusted the detective anymore, like before he had heard of his memory, so there was no need in deceiving them. To Kokichi the statement of Shuichi’s memory self had sounded genuine, leaving it for him to interpret if this was really a good sign or not considering the general meaning of it.

Shuichi seemed to interpret his long silence after his suggestion to work together as a ‘no’ and further tried to convince him of his good intentions until Kokichi gave in and told him he would hear him out.

It took the detective only a few seconds of surprise before his next words caused Kokichi to immediately regret his decision. _I truly don’t want to know what goes through his mind when he says such things to me. **It would probably make me run.**_

Hearing Shuichi’s attempt to apologize only a second later helped only so little to calm himself down. Instead it made Kokichi over-thinking the other boy’s words. To tell the truth he had the same feeling about the personalities merging together and it made him purely terrified. _How should I live like that? I can’t stand the whiny and pitiful person I had become._ He looked over to the other boy. _Or Shuichi. His personality is even more twisted and contrasting._

Kokichi simply knew he should be more terrified and wary of the detective but he just couldn’t. No way could he pull something in his current state alone, so he was in need of someone else, the someone happening to be the other boy. **_Maybe I’m wrong and you are the mastermind and I will die a horrible death due to my bad choice_** _but maybe I’m right and we can end this together._

Also he told Shuichi he wanted to look after Maki first before heading off with him, to which the other boy agreed following Kokichi surprisingly quiet. They arrived at the dormitory and immediately went into Maki’s room, only to find out that someone had already treated her and Gonta’s wounds provisional.

While Maki was resting in her bed, Tsumugi and Gonta were sitting in different spots of the room, so at least she wasn’t alone. Still Kokichi was a bit sad that Maki was already asleep when the two boys got into the room, since he really wanted to speak with her, trying to regain a bit of his confidence before heading off with Shuichi. But he couldn’t blame her for being exhausted after all that had happened to her. After he made sure all of her wounds were bandaged and also grabbed her hand if only for a second, he signaled the detective that he was ready to leave.

They went together into the main building searching for an empty classroom. When they finally settled down in one, Kokichi was greeted with a detective who confessed to him that he indeed had withhold most of the evidence he found during his investigation but did now want to share all of it with him. _Thought so._

After his confession Shuichi surprised him with a sudden question: “Who do you think is the mastermind?”

“Not you,” was his immediate answer, letting his inner voice win. “But besides that I’ve no certain assumption... Iruma-san and Kii-boy were acting strange but I don’t think of either of them as the Mastermind. They probably stay away from us because they try to find the truth in their own way while not trusting anyone else. Also I can’t say for sure that none of them is it, after all Kii-boy was acting pretty odd during the class trial.”

“True,” Shuichi said, nodding to confirm Kokichi’s words. “I think your thoughts aren’t far from the truth. It’s also hard to imagine Gonta as the mastermind, isn’t it? Considering our small number and our observations, that would mostly leave Harukawa-san or Shirogane-san as the mastermind, still having Iruma-san and Kiibo-kun in mind.“

His chest tightened at the mention of Maki as the mastermind. This was the last thing he wanted to think of, luckily the previous events didn’t match that thought. _Maki can’t be **the Mastermind...please not...**_

“Harukawa-chan was nearly...e-executed,” he answered slowly, “if it hadn’t been for us. That makes her less likely the mastermind.” He hoped Shuichi would agree with him, but instead of showing his approval the detective seemed to be lost in his own mind, confusing him with his next statement. “To tell the truth I really wondered what Shirogane-san did during the whole morning.”

“What do you mean?” Kokichi asked irritated. He couldn’t grasp what the detective meant, after all hadn’t Tsumugi told them where she had been in the morning? Was something wrong with her alibi?

Like before Shuichi’s didn’t grant him with a direct answer and instead went for a more extensive explanation why he at first had asked Kokichi to come with him.

“You questioned me if there was something I didn’t tell you all,” Shuichi started. “Well, to tell the truth, a lot actually... See, after you ran away I tried to follow you and...” he stopped for a moment looking guilty upon recognizing what he was about to tell him and decided to drop the topic. _What had he attempted to say!? **What had he wanted to do to me!?** _  

“...well not important anymore...but when I lost your trace I ended up in the dining hall where I witnessed the fight between Harukawa-san and Momota-kun.” Kokichi closed his eyes and inhaled sharply. So Shuichi had seen all of it and didn’t do anything to prevent what would happen next between the two? Could he have saved Kaito if he had interrupted their fight and made himself noticeable to them? In the end it had been Shuichi’s memory self in complete control at that moment and judging from what Kokichi had seen so far found that probably rather funny.

“...And a-after Momota-kun...” at least Shuichi had the decency to stumble over his words, while remembering his friend’s death, “...” The detective had his gaze by now completely fixed on the floor unable to speak further about what he had seen, rising in Kokichi the feeling to want to hug him. Still it wasn’t enough to indeed do it.  

It took Shuichi some time to fight back his pain and continue speaking avoiding that point from now on. “Then I... _it_...came up with the idea to mess with the evidence and grab some poison from my lab. But before I got back into the building I saw Yumeno-san running towards the casino and while being on my way to my lab I saw Shirogane-san through one of the windows on the path between the academy and the dormitory.”

_Despite her being telling us that she never left the dormitory after seeing the memory,_ Kokichi thought, _she told us all she was doing was trying to get Kiibo and Himiko out of their dorm rooms. Also it must’ve been way too early for her to be already outside considering the time she told us she finished seeing the video. So Shuichi was referring to that moment when he spoke about Tsumugi being suspicious._

“When I saw her there it was still half an hour until she would finally find Yumeno-san’s body, isn’t that suspicious?” Shuichi spoke his own thoughts out loud. “Do you think she needed half an hour to ring the bell on both Kiibo-kun’s and Yumeno-san’s door, trying to get in? Of course not! Also taking in account that she told us she finished the memory not before 8:45 a.m.”

“After that,” Shuichi pondered holding his hand over his mouth. “I got back with the poison bottles and...well you know what I... _it_...did with them. When I heard Shirogane-san scream and shortly after that the body discovery announcement played I knew that there was another death and I needed to wander over to the dormitory to find out what I...could do there. I followed you there because I heard you coming out of the warehouse.” Kokichi felt a cold shiver ran down his back. Even if Shuichi’s words didn’t hold any threat at the moment, he was sure that doesn’t count for the actual moment all of that had happened. **_He was so close the whole time..._** _What would he have done to me if he was luckier and found me before he got distracted with the killings? **Better not thinking about it.** Should I risk asking? Do I want to know?_

“So you just walked around the academy while the others were killed?”

“Well-” Shuichi started, again looking guilty, giving the shorter boy already the answer to his question.

“Just continue,” Kokichi sighed.

“A-After figuring out the cause of both Momota-kun’s and Yumeno-san’s death I dropped evidence of the fitting poison next to them and...yeah...”

“How did you get in Yumeno-san’s room without the others noticing?” Kokichi asked curios, since Shuichi’s short explanation lacked important details. Why nobody had seen him around Kaito was rather obvious since the place the tall boy had died were hidden from their direct view, while it was the complete opposite with Yumeno-san. After the announcement the dormitory was never abandoned up until they started investigating but at that point in time the label had already been there.

“Like I said I followed you but when you got distracted from Harukawa-san I sneaked in the lobby avoiding Shirogane-san and Gonta by hiding under the balcony of the second floor. I got my chance to skulk into her room when the remaining two went in direction of the entrance to look after Harukawa-san. And when all of you came back I hide in the closet. Even the Monokuma File was given to me there in secret by Monophanie.”

“That’s for the things I saw and didn’t tell,” Shuichi completed his explanation.

“Fuck,” was all Kokichi could get out at that. “That’s pretty much!”

“That’s why I think Shirogane-san’s behavior has been rather strange, also lying during the trial...” Shuichi remarked.

“But why would she do that to begin with!?” Kokichi asked trying to stop the fear upon finally reaching verdict. “I mean Yumeno-san _had_ her memory, so she would be the prime subject if something happened to the mage, would she not? Of course only if you hadn’t tampered with the evidence.”

“Maybe it was because of the video,” Shuichi told him ignoring the last part. “Maybe a mistake was made.”

“A...mistake?” Kokichi wanted to know.

“The memories had to be true... So what if Yumeno-san not only saw a disturbing memory like the rest of us did, but more...maybe something about Shirogane-san she was never meant to see? Getting further than just a screwed up personality? Something which didn’t make her want to speak with a friend to get over it but instead raised the desire to hide.

“...like her being the mastermind?” Kokichi caught on.   _...Tsumugi?_   Shuichi only hummed in consent to his question.

“She...the mastermind probably made the memories so that we won’t get much information out of it other than our little personality changes, but what if they weren’t finished with editing one of them because they had been disturbed?”

“Disturbed?” Kokichi blurted out. _Wow I’m only getting out single words. Great Kokichi._ Shuichi has a row, has he not?

“Well, like we all knew the monitors weren’t working during the emergency supply and since they’re probably connected to some main computer and server, neither of it would have worked too. That means the mastermind had to work out the memories on something else, maybe something portable? Even Monokuma mentioned that they had to rely on burning DVD’s as alternative to just streaming it due to the emergency power.”

“Something portable?” Kokichi pondered. “Like, considering the mastermind is one of us, the Monopads?”

“Completely right!” Shuichi beamed at him. “After we made our choices which memory we would see I just couldn’t stay in my room and I had some time left until my usual training session with Harukawa-san and Momota-kun, so I wandered around the academy not really aiming for something. That was when I heard a noise coming from the game room...”

A loud crack brought them back into reality, making Kokichi jump. He had been so focused on what the detective was telling him that he had paid his environment no mind at all. A decision he would found out now which hadn’t been a good choice at all.

“Uh, that doesn’t sound good.” Kokichi stammered, searching for the root of the noise.

“And that doesn’t look good,” Shuichi said quietly. When following the detectives gaze Kokichi felt himself petrified by the sight.

Through a small piece of the window they could see the partly colored metal from one of the Exisal’s. The loud noise coming from the same mecha trying to break down the wall to get into the classroom, obviously having no good intentions towards them. It was that moment that Kokichi knew he didn’t want to be at that place anymore when the wall would finally collapse.

“R-Running away?” he asked with a shaking voice.

“Yes,” Shuichi just said, while both boys already started to run out of the room and for their life.

They sprinted through the academy without any goal at all, the loud thumbs of the Exisal never failing to stay much too close behind them. Luckily for the two boy’s the Exisal was too big to follow them as quick as it would need to in order to catch them.

“Where...should we...go...to hide?” Kokichi panted.

His question went unanswered, since suddenly he felt strong hands grabbing his arm, pulling him away from their running path into a crossing hallway. Before he could register what happened the back of his head collided with something hard and his vision went black.

 

* * *

 

When his vision finally turned from black into blurred colors after slowly opening his lids, he nearly screamed once his sight sharpened. His head hurt and his field of vision was completely occupied by...Shuichi’s face way too close above his. Somehow this felt like a déjà vu. **_What?_**

“You’re awake again! Welcome in hell,” the other boy greeted him while grinning madly. It also didn’t help when he finally realized that he had been taken to Gonta’s lab.

“Sorry... I just couldn’t resist,” the detective smiled at him slowly retreating from his view. “That’s payback Ouma-kun.” _Fuck you Saihara Shuichi...but why are we here to begin with?_

After Shuichi backed away Kokichi got enough space to sit up, only to feel a light pain coming from the back of his head. On a second glance he also noticed that he wasn’t alone with the detective anymore. Just a few meters away were Kiibo and Miu sitting on the ground and looking at him. Miu with an annoyed expression plastered on her face, while Kiibo’s stayed mostly blank.

“You hurt your head,” Shuichi told him. He must’ve noticed his hesitation upon trying to get himself up. “...again.”

“Saihara-chan...if you try to touch my head I will kill you, I promise.” He knew he couldn’t do that but still it wasn’t wrong to make the borders clear, especially upon seeing the expression in the other boy’s eyes while watching him.

“I won’t do anything like that,” Shuichi immediately protested.

“He already did,” Kiibo corrected the detective, “when we tried to clean the wound.”

“But that shining pink between your dark hair looked really adorable!” _Damn it!_ Kokichi was definitely not prepared for the pair of soft lips who suddenly pressed against the back of his head, causing a spark to run through his body from the pressure on the wound. “I said I would kiss it better. I can still taste some blood though.”

He pinched Shuichi firmly in his arm.

“Ouch... Ah, I’m so sorry! I think I needed that.”

“If you want to kiss the shota so badly at least do it right!” Miu told him.

“Are we finished now about talking that me bleeding is cute and...other things?” Kokichi interrupted her for his own sake. He didn’t need her making Shuichi think of even more silly ideas. Also he was quite surprised he got the words out in that way _against_ Miu. “And can someone please explain why we’re here?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Miu said in a harsh voice, destroying every progress Kokichi thought he had made before when speaking to her and causing the shorter boy to want to hide behind the detective next to him...well or better not.

“Mostly to avert you from being crushed to mush by an Exisal,” Kiibo told them in place of Miu, who only provided them a short snicker.  

“Still we’re really interested in what information you two shared that pissed the mastermind off?”

“Huh?” Kokichi was rather irritated by the robot’s outgoing words and judging from his face Shuichi felt the same.

“You must’ve obviously talked about something compromising otherwise I won’t think the Exisal would have chased you at all,” Kiibo said in response to their confused faces.

“But how would they have known?” Shuichi spoke up.

“Well before we discuss that point we should make a few things clear first,” Kiibo remarked, “We don’t think one of you is the mastermind because we had observed you quite some time now coming to this conclusion. Even if Saihara-kun has definitely potential to be one after hearing of his memory.”

“Still Iruma-san and I decided we needed you to see the complete truth,” Kiibo went on explaining their thoughts on the matter, “And when we saw you two fleeing from the Exisal we thought even more that we needed to talk to you. That’s why we brought you here... So we will tell you everything we got so far if you two do the same.”

“Deal,” Shuichi immediately said. “As we also don’t think one of you is the mastermind. I already have my suspicion on who it is.”

“Really Shithara?” Miu voice could be heard, “Then start telling.”

However before Shuichi could say anything Kiibo interrupted him with a harsh voice. “But before we start we should probably change places again to not been found due to staying too long in one place.”

Both boys were confused by the statement while Miu just shrugged, but after being saved by them none of the two complained and just followed Kiibo out of the room. They went slowly down the hallway constantly looking for any threat that might face them on their way. Their next stop was the Ultimate Tennis Pro’s lab where Miu used some strange looking device before Kiibo and her relaxed again and requested Shuichi to start explaining what he had meant with his suggestion. 

Without hesitation Shuichi began again to explain what he had witnessed during the whole morning while Kokichi was curios thinking about what happened to Miu and Kiibo. He focused his attention back to the conversation when Shuichi reached the point where the Exasil had interrupted them before.

“So when I opened the door to the game room I found Shirogane-san looking concentrated on her Monopad, but when she recognized my presence it obviously scared her badly, because she let her Monopad fall on the ground. After this incident she focused her attention on me since I decided to stay with her... What if she had been working on the memory videos at that time? And the one she was currently working on before I disturbed her being Yumeno-san’s. Meaning due to me startling her Yumeno-san’s video wasn’t completely edited and erased of any possible hint to the mastermind. Maybe she had to die because she saw too much... T-That makes me somewhat r-responsible for her death, does it not?” The last sentence came out really forced making Kokichi feel bad for the other boy.  

Shuichi seemed pretty shaken by his suggestion while Miu and Kiibo didn’t pay it a second thought and instead told him to continue with his story. So he did. Another remark Shuichi was bringing up were the fact that despite everyone thinking Monokuma tricked them into telling each other about the memories and therefore triggering the following events, it was also true that it had been Tsumugi who first recommended such an act. The detective closed his observations with the statement that they definitely needed to confront the blue haired cosplayer in the upcoming class trial.

Well if they would make it there at all since the Exisal’s seemed determined to smash them to mush before they could even try to attend the next class trial. So the mastermind didn’t want it to happen?

“Hopefully nothing bad had happened to Gonta and Harukawa-san,” Kokichi said quietly. What if one of the Exisal’s had chased them? Maki was in no condition to run away and as if that wasn’t enough if Tsumugi was really responsible for all of this she was still with them...

Shuichi only shot him a short nod in response that he had heard his words before addressing Miu and Kiibo again and demand their part of the story. Well if Kokichi had though Shuichi’s part was already insane and confusing it didn’t get better from there on.

It irritated him even more when Miu started with speaking about the things he had asked her to make what seemed a really long time ago. An Electrohammer to stop the electronics and techniques everywhere trapping them in this place, a remote to control the abandoned Exisal’s due to their Monokubs pilots having died and the third one...something which could suck in the surrounding air. Ever since Gonta had been mentioned the tiny bugs he kept seeing Kokichi was curious about them too and had hoped which such a device to come closer to the truth of the academy. _Maybe this had something to do with the device Miu and Kiibo were using earlier?_

“You suckers see after that damned bear told everyone...” Miu said. “...well let’s just say after I stopped focusing all of my genius brain on the Neo World Program I began to think more of the things Ouma-kun asked me to make for him. He seemed to have forgotten it after the little memory incident but Kiibo-kun and I were looking more into it!” Miu told them excited.

Kiibo continued her explanation from there on: “Well after thinking about what the devices could be possibly meant to be for we discovered quiet the interesting things.” He paused for a moment before speaking up again: “But first Miu found something confusing in my body. Since she is the Ultimate Inventor she helped me with my maintenance and found out that there was an antenna installed inside me which happened to be connected to something or someone _outside_ , constantly sending and receiving data. Iruma-san of course deactivated it and interestingly I haven’t heard my inner voice since then, also I feel much freer in my actions and thoughts. After that event Iruma-san and I decided to observe our situation together and find clues to get us out of here.”

“So that could’ve been a connection to the outside world? Someone...trying to influence you?” Shuichi asked.

“Probably, at least that’s what Iruma-san and I thought,” Kiibo nodded. “I feel much more self-conscious now and not bothered anymore with the urge to push everyone on the path of hope.”After speaking the last words Kiibo decided it was time for them to change places again, this time ending up in Maki’s lab after going through the same step’s like before.

“Well now would be a good time to explain _that_ ,” Shuichi stated looking at the two of them expectantly.

“It’s because the fucking mastermind is spying on us!” Miu provided while Kiibo offered a more detailed explanation: “To start with, Ouma-kun seemed to have the right mind in suspecting the little bugs Gonta kept seeing. Or at least that’s what I think made him request this.” Kokichi just nodded slowly to agree with Kiibo’s deductions. “So we experimented a bit with it only to find out that there are indeed tiny bugs all over the academy which are just too small to see with normal eyesight. Also it happens that these tiny bugs are mechanical bugs obviously used to record us everywhere and every time.”

Shuichi and Kokichi were just staring at the robot in horror. He may have been suspicious of the bugs but he wasn’t sure if he had expected that outcome, still after thinking it through it made way too much sense. Of course the Mastermind would have some method to see what they were up to the whole day and night. How else should they have been in the position to direct the killing game the way they wanted it to. _The way they wanted it to...?_

“And that’s why we need to change places every now and then,” Kiibo closed his explanation, “We free the room of the recording bugs after entering but when a room is out of sight for too long it would also be suspicious. Up until now our theory works, since the Exisal’s haven’t found us yet. So as long as the mastermind is distracted and can’t follow us correctly we need to use our time wisely and think of how we get out of this hell.”

“Then we need to think of a plan,” Shuichi said, smiling a bit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for the late update. I blame starting to work and the hot weather xD  
> Also it took me some time to write the chapter since I didn't thought it happened much in it, despite having it's length, making it more difficult to write it out at all I think...  
> The last chapter will probably take a similar time to write but with more action again ;)


	12. The end of our hell 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gokuhara-kun is probably resting in his own room,” she said in a monotone voice, “Maybe with Shirogane-san looking after him.”  
>  _Hopefully not_.  
>  “But what is all this about Iruma-san and Kiibo-kun and Saihara-kun?” she again changed the topic back to them, being a bit too obsessed with the three for Kokichi's liking. “They were behaving strange the whole time.”  
>  _Well I know why_ , he thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey I'm back!  
> I'm really, _really_ sorry I was gone for so long and wasn't able to post a new chapter.  
>  My life had been really busy the last few weeks. Also I was stuck on the last chapter because I didn't know what I wanted to write for the end. At the beginning this story was meant to be much shorter therefore I didn't have a decent ending for it and needed to write a suitable one!  
> As I could have guessed it turned out to be a longer chapter that's why I split it so I at least could get out one half and you wouldn't need to wait for the whole thing to be finished!
> 
> Also the story only has a few similar elements from the game, since I don't know anything after the fifth trial because I haven't been there yet. The things I know are all from other fics so I'm sorry if something sounds weird! :D
> 
> Hope you're still interested after this time ;)

“If you ask me I would suggest splitting up for the time being,” Shuichi told them, “So we will be able to get as much done as possible while wasting no time.”

Despite acknowledging the truth in the detective’s words, Kokichi wasn’t too fond of the idea to split up and probably end up on his own. Considering the members of his actual group, two memory conflicted uncertainties and a robot, he definitely should feel more safe being on his own then stick with them. Nonetheless this wasn’t the case. _I’m better off alone, **or am I?**_

“Split up?” Miu repeated slowly, obviously debating the idea in her head. Her overall expression wasn’t an easy one to read, but she seemed to look happy about the opportunity to get rid of them.

“Hm, that may not be too bad of an idea,” Kiibo agreed while slowly nodding, “It’s probably the best way to move forward, while not wasting too much time in which the mastermind could be able to stop our actions. Iruma-san and I will work on finding a way out of here, but this won’t work unless the mastermind and the Exisal’s aren’t distracted with something else or _somebody_.”

“You’re right. I could try and corner the mastermind so they would be occupied with me, having no time to watch what you two will be doing.” A short glance to the detective showed Kokichi that this seemed to have been his plan all along, judging from his fast and easy acceptance of the idea. Kiibo and Miu just nodded in response. He didn’t fail to register that no one included him in their plans.

So Kokichi dared to speak up about what he would like to do. Something that was gnawing on his mind for quite some time now. “I-I want to check on Harukawa-chan, make sure the mastermind didn’t hurt her.”

He wasn’t sure if Shuichi would approve his plan since that would mean for each one of the two to go alone, but despite his doubts Shuichi just nodded and said: “That would be for the best I think.” Maybe he wanted him out of the way too? Like Kiibo and Miu. **_Of course he does, who wants to deal with me after all?_**

Even if it was his own decision, Kokichi still needed some time to muster up the courage to finally leave their little group and walk out of the room into an unsafe environment on his own. When he reached for the door handle, standing in the doorframe, he got a quick reminder from Kiibo to watch out because the mastermind would now be able to spy on him again and scheme against him. This also meant the Exisal’s could get on his trail again haunting him down. There was only one of those machines to get the spying bugs out of the way after all and Miu and Kiibo intended to keep it. 

Kokichi inhaled deeply, suppressing the nervous feeling in his stomach, before finally leaving behind the room and safety of the group in favor of sneaking out into the hallway. His want to know if Maki was safe and hadn’t been further hurt was all that drove him at the moment and gave him the strength to go. **_Even if she is in danger right now I wouldn’t be able to help her._**

Nonetheless he wasn’t so stupid as to hurry over to the dorms. With extreme wariness and caution he made his way slowly through the hallways. He stopped at every corner listening in on the sounds to make sure nothing dangerous was within his reach. Hopefully the mastermind would be distracted with what the others were up to and therefore wouldn’t pay him too much mind. After all he wasn’t on a mission to outsmart the mastermind, not like the others.

His ears were overworking, the rest of his body tensing up every time he heard a small noise. When he finally reached the main entrance Kokichi slowly opened the huge doors and looked around the path trying to spot anything suspicious. Luckily for him no one was there. Still he would be seen rather easy being out in the open without anything that could hide his figure. He would be on the presenter out there for the mastermind to see.

But just staying back at the doors wouldn’t get him anywhere and remaining in one place for too long was probably even worse. So he slit out after some time of hesitation and hurried over to the dorms. He himself was surprised that he made it that far without someone chasing or worse catching him. **_Why should the mastermind pay me attention after all when there are bigger threats?_** Considering their actual situation he was definitely the most useless out of the four of the new formed group.

Still his heart pounded way too fast and wouldn't stop when he finally reached the doors to the dormitory. He swallowed his anxiety down and made his way over to Maki’s room. He needed to know what happened to his two friends...

Kokichi couldn’t stop himself from internally laughing at the stupid situation he had gotten himself into; that he had allowed his mind to even think of someone as a friend.

And if Shuichi was right with his deductions, both of them had been left alone with the mastermind for quite some time in a vulnerable and wounded state, not being able to defend themselves and put up much of a fight against whoever may attack them. What if the Exisal’s had headed back to the dormitory after they lost track of Shuichi and him? What if the mastermind had tortured them to find out if they knew anything?

His panic constantly rose as he raised his hand up to the door handle and slowly pushed it downwards. He had no idea what awaited him behind the closed door. It didn’t help calm his nerves that the lobby of the dormitories was left behind in complete silence.

Finally the door was open and a feeling of happiness washed over him when he saw the sleeping figure of Maki under the sheets in her bed. Nonetheless what didn’t make him happy was the fact that neither Tsumugi nor Gonta, who both had sit alongside Maki before he left, where nowhere to be seen. This left him unsettled especially since neither of them had looked like they would leave anytime soon. Maybe Gonta needed some rest of his own and went over to his room? After all he had been getting wounded alongside Maki. **_Or..._** No he didn’t want to think like that.

Still nothing good came from Tsumugi’s absence. She was probably planning something.

Kokichi made his way over to Maki’s bedside and looked at the sleeping face of the assassin. Even if she happened to look relaxed in her dream world the pain she must feel due to the wounds wasn’t completely washed out of her face. He just knew he needed to wake her up and bring her to a place where the mastermind couldn’t hurt her that easily anymore. _Idiot. Why am I feeling attached to people suddenly?_

In the end there was no need to spring into action himself because Maki woke up on her own the moment he settled next to her, obviously alerted by his presence. The girl opened her eyes to look directly at the boy next to her bed.

“Ouma-kun,” the assassin greeted him, her raspy voice betraying her try to look relaxed and calm, “Is everything alright?”

He nodded in response and decided to ask her first if she needed something, to which Maki shook her head. “You sure you don’t need anything? I can get it for you.” She shook her head again and continued to look at him curious, obviously trying to find out why he came back.

“How are you feeling?” he continued. His intention still to find out about the true state Maki was in before telling her more and searching for a way to get them out of the mastermind’s way.

Even if he could already guess the answer to his question, he needed Maki’s own judgement on how much strength she had left. Depending on her answer his plan on taking Maki with him, avoiding Tsumugi and the Exisal’s at all costs, would vary. Good for him the girl seemed to guess the true intend behind his question and answered him truthfully: “My whole body still hurts and I feel exhausted and tired but I think I will be able to get up and walk if that’s the reason you’re asking. I can handle the pain.”

“Well...yes... I’m asking because I wanted to know if you’re capable of moving,” Kokichi admitted, getting a slight nod as sign from Maki in return.

After a short silence and the first hurdle being taken Kokichi spoke out loud the second circumstance that was bothering him. “Do you happen to know where the other two went?” He put his question carefully to not alert Maki immediately since she lacked the information Shuichi had told them in the meantime.

All he could hope for was that they hadn’t left together. Thinking Tsumugi may take advantage of the innocent entomologist and hurt Gonta caused him a sick feeling. To his horror Maki just shrugged and told him that both of them had been in her room before she fell asleep and only now that she had woken up did she acknowledge that they were gone.

_Hopefully Gonta is okay! I need to find him! **But being left alone with the supposed mastermind isn’t a good sign.**_

To his surprise Maki didn’t seemed to shaken despite she obviously could tell something was wrong seeing his reaction. The reason for her delayed answers may be her critical state making her tired and dizzy. That's why she also didn’t bother asking more questions like why he was so worried about the two missing students and what was going on with the others.

After finally propping herself into a sitting position on the bed, Maki began to act more interested in his story. Especially about what had happened after she needed to go and left him behind with Shuichi.

Still this wasn’t the topic he wanted to talk about first, so he tried to bring it back to the two missing students. He couldn’t quite name the feeling but somehow it bothered him that Maki seemed so calm and uninterested about the whole thing considering everything that happened during the trial. Especially with Gonta saving her life during her execution. Shouldn’t she want to make sure he is safe after that?

Gokuhara-kun is probably resting in his own room,” she said in a monotone voice, “Maybe with Shirogane-san looking after him.” _Hopefully not._

“But what is all this about Iruma-san and Kiibo-kun and Saihara-kun?” she again changed the topic back to them, being a bit too obsessed with the three for Kokichi’s liking. “They were behaving strange the whole time.” _Well I know why_ , he thought. “Also I saw Shuichi dragging you away towards the academy before entering the dormitory. What did he do to you? Or tell you? Something important?” _Huh!?_

Being extremely confused by Maki’s behavior he decided to give a careful answer, calculating the sentence in his head before speaking it out loud.

Kokichi also held in mind that the mastermind could be listening in on them at the moment that’s why he needed to let their actual plans and the important details out of it for now. Still he needed to give Maki some information to convince her that the three students were meaning well and also bring her to follow him. He couldn’t let her be in the dark about the danger looming over them.

But he couldn’t deny that Maki’s carefree manner raised doubts inside him. What if Shuichi was wrong and his accusations against Tsumugi were merely bad suggestions? Unwanted thoughts popped up in his mind, especially with Maki’s constant reservation getting onto him too. But who could it be apart from that? To tell the truth it could be every one... _I mean...would I have thought before that it could be Tsumugi_? No, probably not.

Finally he made up his summary for Maki carefully choosing his every word and holding it as short as possible but also as long as necessary. He told her that they had found out important information and secrets about this place they were trapped in and the killing game itself, hoping the whole time his words wouldn’t attract the Exisal’s to their location like it had happened before with Shuichi and him.

Kokichi concluded his summary with the remark that it would be for the best if someone else would tell her the ‘details’, because he wasn’t too good at it. He hoped she would get the hint that his message after all just meant ‘There’s more to say but not here’.

Luckily for him Maki kept on quick, her brain working definitely better than that of the space idiot. She nodded in approval and threw the sheet away, while sitting on the edge of the bed. Maki seemed exhausted just from the short action but gave him a thumbs up to signal it will be okay.

When Maki got adjusted to being up he rethought their conversation in his head. He couldn’t smoother the feeling that something about it felt different to their time together before. It seemed more...forced? What could be the reason for that? Had it something to do with his character change, since it seemed to shift more to his origin personality again? Or was it because of her obvious mistrust of the other three? He grew more and more irritated with every doubt and thought she shared about the remaining students and especially Shuichi.

Somehow the detective was still the number one suspicious person for her when it came to being the mastermind. What made her mistrust him that much? _Not considering his personality._ Maybe because he messed with Kaito’s death? If so then... How could he prove her otherwise? After all there was no other evidence than the detective’s word and reasoning, which Maki didn’t know of at the moment.

He stayed silent during the whole time Maki was rambling about it. He didn’t want to think too deep about the possibility that they were indeed wrong with the found result but he also didn’t agree with Maki. But having no evidences other than words and logic it was mostly because he didn’t want to agree with her. It wasn’t that he couldn’t understand Maki’s fears but he had decided to trust his beloved detective and therefore believed in Tsumugi as the mastermind.

He let his inner conflict shown a bit on the outside so Maki would get the hint that there was more behind it than she could see at the moment with her limited knowledge. Like before she caught on quick and dropped the topic for now while Kokichi simultaneously aimed for a change. Well he could have guessed that it wasn’t the best to do. But he not only wanted to know about her physical strength but also the mental state she was in right now.

“H-How do you feel?” he began again, but made sure she knew what he meant this time. “A-After what happened with Momota-chan?”

Maki stiffened immediately and her gaze went downwards. It was more than obvious that she didn’t want to speak about it.

“I don’t want to talk about him right now... I-I think I still can’t...” she said, “It hurts to think about him and what I...did.” Kokichi understood completely. “If I had only known that it was just worse in the beginning and would’ve gotten better...I... I mean seeing how you and Saihara-kun are bearing with it... I would’ve done anything to prevent that outcome...just even if he wouldn’t have been completely the person from before I should’ve kept him safe and done anything to not lose him.” Her voice trailed off at the end accompanied by a few tears streaming down her cheek.

Maki’s words affected him more than he would be willing to admit. In a way they seemed to also fit his situation, despite being meant for Kaito. But even if Shuichi had a rather opposing personality at the moment, he would do anything to prevent losing him.

After another round of silence Maki lifted herself up from the bed. Judging from the pain in her eyes it was hard for her, but finally she stood wobbly but straight on her own feet. While expecting her to break down every moment because she was overestimating herself and not saying anything Kokichi kept a close eye on her. Even if he wouldn’t be able to do much when it came to catch a collapsing Maki due to his own small and fragile stature.  

“We should look for the others before heading out of the dormitory,” he announced with a side glance to the assassin. Said girl nodded but looked away from him. _Strange_.

Of course he didn’t care much for Tsumugi’s well-being, rather than wanting to know where the suspicious girl was right now, but he was truly concerned about the bug-loving boy.

It hurt him when Maki -again- just shrugged and trailed after him towards Gonta’s dorm room. She walked in a slow pace due to her condition but other than that he couldn’t see too much of the pain she must be feeling right know on her anymore. _At the moment she's an **even better liar than me**. _

With a nervous tension building up inside, equally to when he had opened the door to Maki’s room, he pushed the handle down and the door opened to reveal...a completely empty bedroom.

“He’s...not here,” Kokichi stated slowly, dark thoughts taking over his mind, “Where could he have gone?” **_This is the mastermind’s doing..._**

He immediately turned around and headed over to Tsumugi’s room. _Maybe...?_ Maybe she was there and the two weren’t missing together? But to his horror the cosplayer’s room turned out to be also devote of any life. _No...please, no!_

“Maybe they’re searching for the rest of us in the academy?” Maki suggested no real worry in her face. How could she be so calm? Even if she didn’t know about Tsumugi she should knew about the dangerous situation, especially after _her_ trial.

“Then let’s go back to the main building,” Kokichi said. His thoughts were completely occupied with a defenseless Gonta in the claws of an insane mastermind. That was why, other than Maki, he didn’t register much of his environment.

”Are you okay?” he asked the assassin, “I mean walking over to the academy and searching inside? I can support you so you won’t have to put all of your weight on your injured legs.”

So they headed off, Maki surprisingly taking the offer and leaning slightly on Kokichi for support when they were leaving the dormitory. Nonetheless Kokichi was sure she must be at her limit so he remained with a painfully slow pace, even if he just wanted to run and hide.

They made it a few steps outside before Kokichi spotted a black figure coming from the academy and walking towards them. What was Shuichi doing out there? But before the detective could reach them or Kokichi could think further of the situation a loud crash noise made him flinch. Out of reflex he shot his hands up to cover his ears and prevent them from being damaged by the intense sound. Maki next to him mirrored his movements.

After the noise began to fade away he looked in the direction were he thought it had come from, turning away from the person next to him and the detective. That’s when he felt a sharp tag at his sleeve, while suddenly being dragged away with force. Before he could turn around and find out who had him in their grasp everything went black.

 

* * *

 

The moment Kokichi decided to leave, Shuichi also attempted to flee the room to get away from the remaining two, who were just looking at him suspicion still evident in their eyes.

He was sure they doubted his reasoning about Tsumugi and probably believed in him being the mastermind. Just using the memories as an apology to finally act like himself. **_Well I can fulfill their wishes..._**

It was Kiibo who held him back before he could follow Kokichi out of the hideout. Of course the robot showed a nervous attitude while needing to speak to him. Finally he was able to push his worries aside and stared the detective in the eyes with an unblinking expression. Shuichi did wait patiently for the robot to calm down and get his message across. **_Hurry or I will just walk away._**

With a still nervous smile Kiibo told him that Miu and he had been scanning the area and academy with one of the girl’s inventions.

Did they even sleep the last days? He couldn’t quite believe what he had missed the two doing. Also he had to admit that Miu truly was a genius considering her talent. Not so much with social interactions, though. _But who am I to talk?_

Even if they didn’t expected much in the first place Kiibo told him that they were greeted with something really interesting when looking for the secret room behind the library. According to the robot there was a hidden passage in the walls leading from the room to one of the girl’s restrooms.

Receiving this new piece of information Shuichi decided to start his investigation there. After all this was his best shot in cornering the mastermind so far. That’s why only a few seconds later he was heading straight over to said girl’s restroom. He hesitated for a moment before entering, but this wasn’t the time to let his embarrassment influence his achievements.

Kiibo hadn’t specified where the passage began, so he ended up searching every part of the wall and floor for something suspicious that could lead to a hidden part of the academy.

After quite some time when he was nearly ready to stop and go back asking Kiibo again where exactly the passage began, he indeed found a spot that caught his interest. It was where the cleaning utensils had been stored. His searching fingers glided over the smooth surface only for it to give in and slide backwards. Pressing his finger further against the wall a small black hole opened up before him.

Only after a few crawls in he was surrounded with complete darkness. Shuichi fished for his Monopad to turn on the display light to have at least a rough knowing of the outlines of his environment. It was enough for him to make his way forward carefully.

He crawled for a while trough the small tunnel until he finally reached a dead end. Out of instinct he again pressed his fingers against the wall in front of him only for it to swing slowly outside. His eyes started to hurt at the sudden blindness caused by the white light of the room at the end of the passage.

Packing his Monopad away he got himself over the edge of the shaft into a very strange looking room. Mostly in white colors, a lot of different technique was greeting him. Being it for the good or worse no one else was there which meant the mastermind must be still outside in the academy.

_So Tsumugi isn’t here... I can’t confront her and this also means she is with the others. I should go as fast as possible over the things I found in here and hope that Miu and Kiibo will be alright and ready to go through with their plan. Hopefully Kokichi is okay too..._

**_If not there’s new fun!_ **

The first thing to catch his eye was the huge amount of monitors all actually streaming from different parts of the academy. So Kiibo and Miu were right about their suggestion that the mastermind followed them everywhere with their eyes. The locations on the monitors where constantly changing whilst he was looking. He hadn’t seen Miu and Kiibo until now but he did see Maki and Kokichi for a short time talking calmly in the assassin’s room while Maki still rested in her bed.

He shifted his gaze to the other things in the room. A somehow big machine in the background corner caught his eye but it seemed off for the moment so he decided to investigate it later. Instead he walked over to the table, reaching for a shiny object laying on the surface.

_Is that a shot put ball? ...Another one!?_ It did seem like that. Also it had dried blood on it opposing to the one that actually killed Rantaro this one only had some blood sprinkles. _How is this possible?_ **_Seems like someone else did spice up another trial!_**

The next thing that he found where some books and documents, all referring to something called ‘Danganronpa’, stacked next to some Monokuma plushies. He only overlooked the first pages, to find out it was talking about some kind of TV show. _A killing game TV show!?_

Before he could think further of it a movement brought his attention back to the monitors. Shuichi finally got a glimpse of Miu and Kiibo at the border wall behind the dormitories, setting something up there. But this wasn’t what made him hesitate for a moment. His eyes were fixated on the screen showing Maki’s room again. Both students in there seemed about to leave but while Kokichi went ahead and had his back towards Maki, the girl reached for something in the drawer, hiding it in the pocket of her skirt. His eyes grew wide. Wasn’t this small bottle the Strike-9 poison she had demanded from him to hand over earlier? Why now out of all times would she reach for it? Especially considering she did it behind Kokichi’s back?

**_Seems like it’s getting interesting again._ ** _I need to warn him! **Ah can’t I just look what will happen? This seems like a good place to stay.** I need to help Kokichi!_

He got an unsettling feeling inside his stomach which let him to the decision, despite the room still holding a lot of material to investigate and information to discover, that there was another place he was needed more. The cheerful and anticipated voice inside his head also drove him out fearing the worst.

Following his feeling he exited the room through its main door into the library, making a fast detour to his lab before aiming for the main entrance of the academy. Only seconds after exiting the academy and spotting the pair coming out of the dormitories, a loud sound shot painfully through the air and made him jump. _What-!?_

He looked into the direction of the sound only to be greeted with a lot of smoke. Was this Miu’s and Kiibo’s doing? Did they actually blow up a crack into the doms wall?

When he looked back to where Kokichi and Maki had been standing only seconds before he was met with an empty way. Confused about where the two could have gone so suddenly he went over to the point where he had seen them last. **_Here we go._**


	13. The end of our hell 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Won?” he repeated for everyone to hear, taking Maki’s place in challenging the robot. “Do you call this game a victory for us? It’s been a horrible disaster from the beginning! How much of us had died on the way that led to now? If nothing else the only thing we can truly say is that it finally ends and luckily not with the student number Monokuma had in mind...” _**That’s right but...**_ “All of this so called _game_ was just a huge disappointment.” It seemed the other people in his group were smart enough to ignore this last statement. **_A huge disappointment!_**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally the last chapter!   
> I attempted at an open ending for it since something too determined wouldn't have fitted in my eyes.  
> Well the truth is it's not completely the end. I also have a short Epilogue waiting to be posted!
> 
> So enjoy these last parts of the story!  
> I also want to say I'm really grateful and happy about all the Kudos and comments this story received! I thank you all so much for reading and encouraging it! <3

Kokichi woke up to a dim lit room a throbbing pain in his head that spread further all over the rest of his body. Despite just having woken up he still felt tired combined with being extremely confused and quite disoriented to the extent that he couldn’t figure out where he was.

All he could make out were shades that seemed rather familiar upon second glance. So...he was in one of the classrooms. How did he get in there? The last he could remember was Maki standing next to him, an approaching Shuichi as well as a loud noise, but...nothing after. Whilst his head spun with too many different thoughts at once, making it quite stressful for him to think clearly, a small laugh from the other side of the room caught his attention.

_Is that Maki’s voice...? **It sounds concerning and nothing like her.**_

He still felt too weak to even prop himself up from the ground and investigate the source of the laughter. Not able to do anything else he just stayed in position, which meant sitting on the floor, leaning against one of the tables and staring into the darkness.

_Something is wrong with me, **isn’t it?**_

When he saw movement in the corner of his eye he looked up only to see a very Maki-like figure approach him slowly. _Could that be possible? **I was with her last wasn’t I...?**_

“H-Harukawa-chan...?” he got out, his voice sounding as weak as his body was feeling. Why did he stutter, hadn’t his personality been more stable again lately? “What happened? Where...where are we?” All he got in response at his pathetic question was the same laugh he had heard before. Was that...really Maki?

“Harukawa-chan...?” he asked again due to the lack of a proper response from the assassin. When she was finally close enough for him to see more than her outlines he spotted an odd expression spreading across her face. An expression he wouldn’t normally link with the strong and cold but also soft hearted Maki. That’s why he just stared back when she stood before him, towering over him and smiling creepily. He raised his head to look her into the eyes only to _not_ find Maki there. Even if her whole appearance told him otherwise.

“W-Who are you?”

Again he earned one of these disgusting giggles before the person vanished back into the shadows. “So you saw through my cover finally?” he got his response from the shadows, this time the voice not sounding like Maki’s anymore, instead...

A girl was stepping back into what little light the room provided, now dressed completely different. Long blue hair falling to her side instead of two brown pigtails.

“You-!” Kokichi shouted at her and tried to stand up only to fall back hard onto the floor hurting himself in the process. A wave of dizziness and pain shot through him. “Where’s Harukawa-chan? What did you to do her?” _So Shuichi had **been right.**_

The blue haired cosplayer in front of him just smiled. “Oh, well you could say somewhere around,” she answered, obviously avoiding a true answer to his question. “She took a short walk outside of her room with me, not coming back afterwards...”

Kokichi froze upon Tsumugi’s words, every one spoken with a mad smile. What could she have done to the other two? So...did that also mean the person he found lying in Maki’s bed in her room had been Tsumugi all along? How insane could a person be? Still it would explain her strange behavior.

“...And before you ask, of course I can cosplay whoever I want. I was just lying about the disease.” He hadn’t even thought about that detail, being too busy with more pressuring things, like what had happened to the real Maki and Gonta and the reason for the pain coursing through him.

While staying focused on the sickening sight of Tsumugi in front of him, Kokichi also fought an internal battle with himself. He tried to hold back his anxiety, which was triggered by the still lingering weakness inside him and the fact that his vision had become a bit blurry in the last moments. He also blamed the fact that he had issues breathing on a pathetic panic attack...at least he wished it to be that way. _But I’m only lying to myself, am I not? **I’m going to die.**_

“W-What did you do to...me?” he questioned her with a shaky voice. 

In response he got a small bottle thrown at his feet. He was too weak to catch it before hitting the ground. Nonetheless the bottle didn’t break. The label, telling him that the Strike-9 poison was inside, still perfectly readable. So Tsumugi poisoned him...he was going to die... He felt a deep need to just start laughing.

“Feeling already the effects?” Tsumugi asked while looking down at him. She didn’t seem to expect an answer at all, which Kokichi anyhow denied her. Well he _did_ feel the effects. Torn between wanting to punch Tsumugi and start laughing like a creep, he sadly had to admit he was already too weak to even try hitting her. That only left his mouth to work with, but even if he could’ve shouted something back at her it would’ve been smothered by the loud noise signalling a wall breaking accompanied by a beam of light suddenly falling into the room.

While Tsumugi gasped and immediately turned around, Kokichi took his time to turn his drowsy and heavy feeling head towards the source of the interruption. But the sight that spread in front of him was worth the effort. An Exisal had broken down the wall dividing the class room from the outside and standing next to the mecha were Shuichi and Kiibo. The latter with a remote in his hand. _Was this the one I requested from Miu?_

When the situation came crushing back on him Tsumugi was already shouting a lot of things at the two boys, well one boy and a robot, but all his ears were able to catch and his mind to process was: “...These are mine!... Stop!... I won’t allow you to control them...any longer... you’ll see...” Then she suddenly ran out of the room through the door leading to one of the hallways. The Exisal began to chase after her after a few seconds of Kiibo pressing some buttons on the remote. 

While he was focused on Tsumugi running he hadn’t noticed when Shuichi had been coming over to him, nor had he registered that the detective probably talked to him for quite a while at this point. His face showing more and more concern. ... _Wait... Did I...space out?_ It was so difficult to think at this point.

His pain stained and clouded thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a bottle firmly pressed to his lips. He didn’t resist and let the liquid run down his throat. _Is this the **rest of the** **poison to finally finish me?**_

When he fainted after the liquid reached his stomach, he didn’t even feel the hands catching him from hitting the hard floor anymore.

 

* * *

 

“Do you think we found him in time?” Kiibo asked worried while looking at the unconscious figure of the small supreme leader. Due to his fragile figure he fitted way too well in the detective’s arms, who had caught him before he could hit the floor.

Shuichi gently rested his finger against the boy’s wrist and nodded slowly. “Yes...he’s still alive. I think he probably fainted from the pain, but he should wake up again soon.”

True to his words the boy in his arms began to squirm in his grip after a few minutes, eyelids fluttering open again. When Kokichi finally woke he needed a few moments to get back to reality and processing their actual situation. That was until he noticed that Shuichi was holding him tight in his arms.

“Nishishi~ Saihara-chan, I wouldn’t have thought you’re the direct guy! If you wanted to kidnap and take advantage of my weak body you should’ve prepared your plan better, so I wouldn’t wake up too early!” He raised his head and got out of the arms of an extremely confused Shuichi, only to spot Kiibo. “And you even have an accompanist! Or do you just want an audience?”

_What!? What was going on?_

“What the hell are you talking about Ouma-kun!?” Shuichi couldn’t completely stop his cheeks from heating up, not knowing what had happened to the short boy in the time he was unconscious. Judging from Kiibo’s look, the robot didn’t know either how to put Kokichi sudden change in behavior. _Since when is Kokichi so confident again? **Maybe I should put him in his place.**_

“Well first Monokuma is telling us about a new motive and then you were trying to drug and kidnap me!” the supreme leader provided as answer, which only helped to confused the other two further.

Shuichi had no idea what was going on in the mind of the shorter boy. His memory seemed to be messed up. Could it be the effect of the poison that caused amnesia? And how long would it take for him to remember again? His last question got answered earlier than he thought. Judging from the short but visible drop of the smile in Kokichi’s face he seemed to regain at least some of the memories. His gaze also shifted to his bandaged arms.

“...”

“...Wait... That wasn’t a bad dream?” He looked over to the other two only to be met with a serious expression in both faces. “But then...” Finding his composure again he immediately got back to his usual smile taking a step away from them. “So Saihara-chan really has gone insane!”

Said detective was growling slightly in response. He didn’t know how it had happened but the poison indeed seemed to affect the supreme leader’s memories. Or did he just need some time after waking up to get himself together? But it was undeniable that he acted off, at least compared to the way he acted recently.

“Hey, hey!” Kokichi shouted. “So we can cure everyone by nearly killing them isn’t that a wonderful idea!?” _Cure!? So is his memory self really gone or is he just getting better at acting and lying again?_ Still the short boy seemed to make the same connections than he did between the poison and his way of acting. _Or did he use it as an excuse? **He’s probably just tricking us into thinking he’s fine again. I won’t be fooled by that.**_

“Just stop it!” Kiibo told him but instead of hearing them out Kokichi just danced backwards, slowly making his way over to the door.

“No can do!” he smiled before slipping out of the room.

“Ouma-kun!” Shuichi was yelling after him, “Come back!” _Why is he doing this? He should know how dangerous and needless it was to run off like that. They should stick together... **I should get him and find out what’s wrong! But first I need to handle the robot...**_

Shuichi gazed over to said robot, only to be met with an ominously look on Kiibo’s face. He didn’t need him to speak it out loud for the detective to get the idea behind that expression. “Don’t you dare think about giving me poison too. Also we don’t know if he isn’t just acting due to which reason whatsoever.”

“...What do we do now?” Kiibo decided to change the topic after an uncomfortable moment of silence.

Shuichi sighed. “We need to find him.”

“Split up?” Kiibo offered simply. It was more than obvious that he didn’t want to stay alone with the detective any longer than necessary.

“Yes that’s probably for the best,” Shuichi answered not really convinced but since Kokichi brought them into such a situation they needed to find a solution and find it fast.

“Let’s meet again by Iruma-san at the cracked dome wall,” Kiibo said before leaving in direction of the crashed wall.

“Okay,” Shuichi nodded heading for the door to the hallway and therefore following Kokichi’s path. At least he hoped he would.

While making his way through the dark hallways, low noises could be heard coming closer. Shuichi wasn’t sure how to put them, but it was obvious they wouldn’t bring anything good. A look outside the window made his worst suggestions come true. Down there were three Exisal’s heading for the main entrance of the academy. _Three!?_ _How is that possible? Are they controlled by Kiibo’s remote? But that can’t be, can it?_ Kiibo should be somewhere around but to gather that much Exisal’s he would have needed to find their hideout first. **_I should’ve taken the remote from the robot and brought them under my control._**

The only other possibility was that Tsumugi somehow managed to regain control over every Exisal back or...produce new Monokubs? Could that be possible? _I mean they’re dead, aren’t they? Well of course not taking in account that they aren’t really alive to begin with._

His search led him to the entrance hall, where he had seen the Exisal’s enter only a short amount of time before. Carefully Shuichi approached the place but lucky for him no danger was in sight, at least no moving one. Instead a big hole in the roof let some more light in, probably caused by one of the Exisal’s coming in, fallen down chunk making it difficult to walk.

But what made him hesitate for a moment wasn’t the hole in the roof but the one in the floor. It was really long and he could see stairs leading further down? So something had been under the floor the whole time? Obviously Miu and Kiibo hadn’t inspected that place, but that wasn’t a real surprise to him since both already told that they had mostly focused on the hidden room in the library.

Slowly he made his way over to the stairs and went down. Was there any possibility Kokichi had gone underground? Having no idea at all where the confused supreme leader could’ve been gone he decided to investigate the new place.

Hallways like catacombs greeted him and Shuichi was truly surprised about how big the place seemed to be. He headed around a corner only to be met with another hallway. At the first crossroad he stopped. Mostly because mechanical sounds could be heard from the right side, while he saw a door on the left seemingly leading to another ultimate’s lab?

Ignoring the certainly locked lab only one direction remained. But would he walk right into a trap by following Monokuma’s trail? Or would this lead him where he needed to be, namely a place where he found Kokichi? **_Probably both._**

Approaching the noise led him to an open space. Shuichi was standing on a spot somewhat above the floor, stairs leading down to the ground where two Exisal’s had been gathered.

He tilted his head slightly because the two Exisal’s weren’t the only ‘alive’ ones in the room. Underneath him at the end of the staircase he saw a way too familiar bunch of purple hair, while next to the Exisal’s Maki and Gonta were tied together to a pole. Both presumably unconscious. **_So here’s where the mastermind had isolated herself from us._**

He debated with himself what the best way to get down without someone or something noticing him would be. Maybe it wasn’t a good idea at all with the Exisal’s on guard, it could be too risky. Another option would be to wait what the other boy, already down there, was up to and spring into action when their enemies were distracted. _Speaking of Kokichi how did he even get down there in the first place? **Why is he here?**_

Deciding to climb down the metal stairs would likely attract attention due to the fact that it sure would make quite some noise not to mention that there was nothing to hide behind. If he stayed here at least he could hide behind the rail in the shadows. But for how long?

Shuichi’s thoughts came to an abrupt hold when a loud noise blow down the hallway, leading to the platform he was standing on, coming closer fast. He felt the whole ground shaking. But before he could react in any way like trying to hide or turning around to figure out what was causing the noise, a large metal arm already invaded his view. It took only a second for it to push the still frozen detective over the railing down into the room.

While falling down at least two meters onto a hard ground surprisingly didn’t hurt as much as Shuichi would’ve thought, the attention he gained from the movement was much worse. The least he would’ve wanted was the attention of the Exisal’s already in there. He definitely should’ve paid more attention to the happenings behind his back.

“Oh look who’s joining our party,” a cold voice said not far away from him, “Are you finished snooping around my room and disturbing my plans?” When he looked upwards he saw a person emerge from the shadows near the two captives walking over to him. **_She’s annoying._**

He decided against standing up, at least for the moment, since the pain in his right leg hadn’t subsided much. It had been the one that caught his fall and even if the fall itself hadn’t hurt as much as it could have, his damned leg did. So he just looked up at Tsumugi when she finally reached his position on the floor and returned her emotionless stare.

For a second he thought about crawling away but the Exisal that had thrown him down from the platform sprung down after him, keeping Shuichi from going in that direction while Tsumugi prevented the other option.

Not that he really wanted to flee after they had come that far. At least not completely, because while one half of him was fighting down a panic attack, the other just calmly awaited Tsumugi’s reaction, being excited what would be the next step of the mastermind. He avoided her gaze after a moment of tense silence and looked over to the two tied up persons. **_I won’t cringe before such a disappointing mastermind._** _I hope Maki and Gonta are okay._

“It seems your motive got a bit out of hand,” he stated letting his more confident side decide over the words spoken. Tsumugi replied with a pissed off look. “Seems like that... I should’ve just spiked your meals with some drugs. That would’ve been the safer option.”

“”If that’s all you can come up with...” Shuichi unimpressed answered. “You have no creativity at all... I mean the thought behind your motive wasn’t that bad, but the implementation was just rushed and stupid...it shows how desperate you were to come up with _anything_ new after the blackout to stop your plans from crumbling to dust.” **_And showing through your actions how much of an amateur you are._**

“Still so confident, detective? You don’t seem in a position to be,” Tsumugi remarked, “I wonder how it will feel for you when you get crushed by an Exisal in one minute, shutting you up finally.” Relaying on the insane Shuichi’s thoughts which allowed him to tune the threatening death down, he just smiled because the other option would’ve been to start crying and panic.

So that’s your plan now?” he asked. “Going around and killing us all? Just because we found you out? How do you think you will regain your face with that? That doesn’t sound exiting at all.”

He thought about everything Kokichi had figured about this ‘game’ and all the things he saw in the mastermind’s room before he decided on his next words. “So you’re stopping to please your audience and just go through with ordinary revenge because we ruined your little game? There’s no going back for you anymore...You simply...failed.”

Noticeable hate could be seen in the girl’s eyes but she just shrugged it off after finding her composure again. Shuichi could see the shadow of the Exisal coming closer, a fist raised behind him. He didn’t bother standing up and trying to flee because there was no running away. _So that’s how I die,_ he thought. As bad as the situation was, his inner struggle made it even worse. While one of his personalities was ready to die at the hand of the mastermind even through such a simple act, the other side still searched for a way to escape. _I wouldn’t be fast enough but maybe I can stop her with the right words? **Just kill me already and do something right for once. I want to get out of this farce.**_

His body still felt heavy from the fall, at least the pain wasn’t too prominent anymore. So Shuichi stayed on the ground trapped between an Exisal that was about to crush him any minute now and the mastermind who had two more Exisal’s to back her up.

But even if his situation was bad, the killing game was at its end, after all there had been too many mistakes made by the mastermind so far. Only one question remained; How many of them would be finally able to make it out alive? How many would fall victim to the mastermind in her final revenge?

He closed his eyes not trying to get past his enemies and waited for the last strike to come. It was Tsumugi’s hiss that made him open his eyes again only a few seconds after closing them. He raised his head simply to look directly at a metal fist that had stopped midway above his head. _What!?_ It didn’t take too long for his question to be answered.

When Shuichi got an overview of the situation he discovered Miu standing next to the frozen mecha, having one of the electrohammers in her right hand.

Surprised that there wasn’t an immediate reaction from the other side of the room, where the other two Exisal’s gathered, he looked over. Just like the one about the crush him both of them had been stunned, obviously from Kiibo who was standing right next to them one hammer in each of his hands. While their attention was focused on each other, from the corner of his eyes Shuichi saw a short figure approach the two captives. **_Really I’m getting out of this? Ending a killing game alive without having killed anyone? How boring..._** _Please stop._

Luckily enough it seemed the Monokubs weren’t able to leave the Exisal’s in their frozen state. So for now only Tsumugi remained as a threat. Sure enough Monokuma was coming to Tsumugi’s aid but only for the two of them to flee the scene when everyone else was more fixated on helping each other. Shuichi felt disappointed that they got away so easily but after all without functioning Exisal’s they weren’t really a threat to them anymore. **_Running away from their destiny...how embarrassing._**

Shuichi finally stood up, a bit wobbly on his legs, with some difficulties due to the pain in his leg coming back. He slowly walked over to the rest of the group, because all other students had gathered around Maki and Gonta who had been freed by Kokichi and were beginning to regain consciousness again.

Shuichi looked over of what remained of their group after 5 trials. Even if they had been reduced to such a small number he also had to admit that it could’ve been worse. Half of the students standing around him could’ve been dead by now if not for pure luck or getting help in time.

Considering the killing game wasn’t meant to end if more than 2 people were alive, 6, not counting Tsumugi to their group, was a remarkable number. Part of him had considered they wouldn’t find Maki and Gonta or even Kokichi in time, leaving them to be killed by the mastermind.

Looking over the group he also noticed Kokichi had been behaving quieter again, a big contrast to his act after being poisoned. He truly must’ve acted at that time, meaning his personality had gained more stability. Merging together what had retained him before. Like getting control back over his masks, but still keep a thoughtful nature?

_... How will I end up if that happens to me? Will it happen to me? Are my personalities even capable of merging without getting me insane? They’re so different... **I don’t want your issues restraining me! Stop thinking about the others and let’s have some fun.**... No...stop. _ Discussing with himself turned out to be really tiring. 

The two people on the ground started to move more, eyes beginning to flutter open. Both of them still had some ropes loosely around their body, while pink blood escaped from reopened wounds. Kokichi exhaled a breath he had been holding in upon seeing them waking, before successfully switching back to one of his cheerful smiles.

“You’re really lucky the slut over there saved you!” he announced this time looking directly at Shuichi. “Otherwise you would’ve been nothing more than a depressing sheet of black fabric on the ground. It wasn’t really smart of you to present yourself like that to the mastermind.”

Hearing Kokichi getting more and more back to his older annoying self was for once reassuring but it also made the detective slightly angry. Especially in this situation where he ended up being the victim of his teasing.

That’s why he snapped at him, putting the logical thoughts aside: “It would be for the best if we finally find a way out of this place. Don’t forget that there are still two more Exisal’s out there. Not mentioning a running free mastermind and Monokuma and not taking in account that we don’t know how long the Exisal’s will even stay frozen like this.” He paused for a moment holding Kokichi’s gaze not turning away for even a second. “If you hadn’t run away while behaving like an idiot we could already be out of this hell, through the break Kiibo-kun and Iruma-san made.”

“Yeah,” Kokichi snared back, “And leave Harukawa-chan and Gonta-chan behind in the process or how had you thought their rescue would take place? I at least tried to find them!” **_I want to make him shut up._**

“Stop it!” Kiibo interrupted the two brawlers with a stern voice, having enough from them accusing each other and forgetting the more pressuring issues. “We walk out of here the moment Harukawa-san and Gokuhara-kun are fully awake and able to walk.”

While still none of them was common with Kiibo’s new confident and determined attitude, his spoken command resulted in them just accepting nearly everything without much resistance.

Even Kokichi with his new found old attitude stayed quiet, well at least the first seconds after Kiibo’s intervention. Then he just put on a cheerful smile and picked at the robot: “Since when are you so confident Kii-boy? Don’t go playing leader when there’s already one here! ...Don’t tell me Iruma-chan put some upgrades in you so you finally have balls of steel...” Stopping to snicker was surely the best option to make Kiibo even madder at him.

“Stop it with your robophobic remarks!” Kiibo scolded him harshly. “I was fonder of your anxious and shy side.” Kokichi made a face at him and just mumbled: “Stupid...Kii-boy.” He seemed to have more to say but before he could continue angering Kiibo a hand grabbed his wrist shutting him up in the process. “Ouma-kun...” a soft voice called out to him. Maki looked up at the group still pale and dizzy.

“You’re awake,” Shuichi simply stated, while Kokichi gave Maki his hand to help her standing up, which wasn’t too easy for her due to the still hurting wounds. At the same time Kiibo helped Gonta standing up, who had also been stirring awake simultaneously to Maki.

But opposite Maki Gonta seemed more confused, not being able to focus on anything truly. At least he was alive and able to stand on his own, but worryingly silent and distant. All of the last happenings must have hurt him hard.

“So... Shirogane-san?” Maki got out after finally reaching a stable condition. “I... I couldn’t believe it at first... I was so exhausted from the trial and the wounds I got, that I immediately fell asleep after Ouma-kun left, paying no more mind to Shirogane-san and Gokuhara-kun. I should’ve been more wary...” Even if she tried to show them a tough girl at the outside the exhaustion could be clearly heard in her voice. “...if not for me than for Gokuhara-kun, since if it hadn’t been for him I wouldn’t be here anymore...” Gonta still stayed quiet during Maki’s emotional talk but began to look at her. “...maybe this would’ve been better, after all I deserved the execution...” The last sentence was only mumbled and meant for no one to hear but Shuichi who was standing really close to Maki heard it nonetheless and judging from Kokichi’s reaction he did too. **_Well she isn’t wrong._**

“Don’t say such things!” Kokichi told her. “Don’t you dare do something stupid Ms. Assassin!” It seemed he could put his jokester personality at rest sometimes and be more open than before, especially with Maki. “But it’s true,” the girl answered, “I deserved it for everything I’ve done...”

“But you’re still here,” Shuichi flinched at the bluntness of his own words but there was no taking back now.

She looked over with her piercing gaze at least for a short moment. “Do you want to know why?” When she got a slow nod from the detective she continued: “After falling asleep I woke up the first time tied up here with Gokuhara-kun. I wouldn’t have fought my fate at all but I did because I promised myself to save him and in addiction help all of you get out of here... This is my promise, to make up for the things I did. At least while I can’t redo the damage I want to prevent even more.”

He shared a short look with Kokichi before just nodding Maki’s words off. Shuichi needed to make a mental note that after they were able to flee they needed to keep a close eye on the girl. Also he was sure Kokichi was thinking exactly the same even if his face stayed blank, since there had been a huge turn in the relationship between the two after the memory incident. **_Why should I care if she lives or dies? It’s her decision isn’t it?_**

“Shirogane-san was there with us talking about the ways she wanted to trick you...but then I fell unconscious again.”

Her statement was followed with a moment of silence before Kiibo spoke up: “Can we please go out of here? Everyone seems now capable of walking.” All of them nodded in agreement and turned to the exit. For now everything was said and the wish to finally escape overpowering every other thought.

When they came back to the crossroad he caught Kokichi looking intensely over to the strange door Shuichi had seen on his way down. “It looks like another lab, does it not?” he told the shorter boy. “It’s mine!” he got as a surprising answer. “And I never got the chance to look into it!”

“Don’t stress yourself,” Miu told him, “Feel free to stay back and look into it twink. No one will miss you. Not when my genius self is still here!”

“Shut your mouth you stupid slut!” Kokichi shot back. He made no attempt to look at the lab any longer and stayed with the group. Hearing the bicker between the two felt nearly too normal to be true. How stupid it may sounded the normality of it gave Shuichi some hope. Hope that there was a future for them in which he also could find a way to live with the insane invasive thoughts in his head. **_Try. I’m stronger than this pathetic version of me. I only leave it be because there’s no fun anymore in here. So all I can do is abandon this game for a better one to come in future._** He could feel tears in his eyes, but willed them away. _Why can’t I stop thinking such disgusting thoughts?_

All of them exhaled a breath and immediately relaxed the moment they stepped through the main doors and onto the gravel path. No danger could be seen around and no noises heard which may hint to an Exisal being close. Even if he was grateful for it Shuichi couldn’t stop wondering where all of them had gone. It would’ve been easy for the mastermind and Monokuma to find the two still powered Exisal’s and send them after the group of weakened students. But all in all the whole academy was just too quiet. Did she flee completely? But why? Did she admit defeat and just went away to leave them by themselves?

It doesn’t sit right with him at all. Before, the mastermind was acting in rage to get his revenge and now she just fled after a weak rebellion from them? Without even a real fight? She could’ve played on time, after all the other Exisal’s wouldn’t stay dead forever. They would’ve probably recovered from their power shut down making the Monokubs able to control them again or get out. _It feels too easy_. **_Just go._**

For every step they got nearer to the crack in the domes wall, Shuichi found it harder to believe they truly had made it. But still nothing. No mastermind. No Monokuma. No Exisal’s. Nothing at all.

He let himself hope but the thought of Tsumugi stopping them lingered. If she really flew with her associates to get to safety, there was nothing to worry, not now. But would she come back for them in future for ruining her game? He shivered at the thought that the mastermind may have let them go only to stay in the dark, waiting for the right moment when they wouldn’t expect an attack anymore.

“They nearly won,” Kiibo said when they walked over the meadow next to the dormitory building. “But in the end we made it.”

“Maybe,” Miu interrupted, “But this genius brain defeated them with her breathtaking inventions!”

It didn’t surprise Shuichi when he heard a loud cough in answer to those words, since he actually did know where the ideas originally had come from. “Don’t you forget something?” the supreme leader asked her in return with a sweet voice. “Maybe _who_ had the ideas for them in the first place and figured we would need such things?”

Shuichi placed a hand on his temple. He felt his head starting to hurt. It had been way more peaceful with only the memory self of Kokichi. But it wasn’t really the case that he wanted this Kokichi back, at least not completely. While his detective self felt more drawn to the mysterious and joking Kokichi his darker half seemed to be obsessed with the anxious and sad one. He didn’t know how to deal with the feelings at all and having both of his personalities drawn to the short boy wasn’t helping either.

“Won...?” Maki just repeated the words Kiibo had thrown at them. Her voice was obviously full of disbelieve but her eyes showed no emotion at all. Nonetheless it represented the same feeling Shuichi had when he was hearing those words.

“Won?” he repeated for everyone to hear, taking Maki’s place in challenging the robot. “Do you call this game a victory for us? It’s been a horrible disaster from the beginning! How much of us had died on the way that led to now? If nothing else the only thing we can truly say is that it finally ends and luckily not with the student number Monokuma had in mind...” **_That’s right but..._** “All of this so called ‘game’ was just a huge disappointment.” It seemed the other people in his group were smart enough to ignore this last statement. **_A huge disappointment!_**

Shuichi overcame an extreme exhaustion and he felt tired. How was Kokichi able to get around with that voice in his head so well? And why was it so difficult for him? He felt always so tired when the other was interfering, that he just thought about letting him be and stopping to fight. It would be easier and he could finally get some rest from this pain...

“Hey Saihara-chan!” a loud voice interrupted his gloomy thoughts bringing him back to reality and most important out of the prison of his own mind. “Don’t give up that easily!”

“Huh?”

Kokichi glanced at him with a smile. “You looked like you wanted to die right here and there.” Had he been that obvious? His thoughts clearly displayed on his face for the others to see or was Kokichi just good at figuring him out?

He looked away to avoid his gaze. Luckily the rest of them were too focused on themselves to pay them any mind. “It’s just that memory monster making me so tired every time it interferes... I don’t know what to do anymore or how to behave... You instead seem to have getting pretty used to it by now.” He couldn’t keep the defeat from his voice, so certainly the short boy would pick up on it.

“It’s just a lie...but also the truth,” Kokichi stated only confusing the detective more. “My thoughts are still influenced by both sides but I’m able to decide how to act and not being overwhelmed by the foreign me anymore. But that doesn’t mean he’s gone.” _The greatest evidence is the way he’s acting towards me right now,_ Shuichi thought, _normally he would never be open about his feelings like that or anything similar..._

Still hearing such comforting and caring words from Kokichi made him feel better. And strangely enough what he was telling him felt like the truth. While it was obvious he acted like before the memory incident, it was also clear that the impact of it still lingered, sticking out in the way he chose his wording.

“Maybe you just need a bit more time...” Kokichi reassured him.

After that shared moment the two boys fell into a comfortable silence. They had been fallen behind the rest of the group and only now catching up while the black crack was already visible right before them.

“What’s up with the blonde bitch?” Kokichi suddenly asked looking curios at Miu. “Since the trial you keep acting way too normal. I mean not that someone would dare to ever call you normal, but something isn’t right... You sure tricked us all.”

_That’s actually true_. _Miu’s behavior since the memory incident had been strange._ _But I haven’t thought about it much. Some detective I am...too occupied with myself to even notice the obvious things. **Little lying bitch.**_

He wondered what the reason behind it was but before he could ask Miu already presented him the answer: “Well maaaybe Kiibo and I decided it would be for the best if the mastermind at least thought one of us was affected by this stupid motive, so we made up my memory self. But the truth is we only made us more suspicious in the eyes of the mastermind since after we found out what the memories do Kiibo couldn’t tell me the real deal, ending in something else which of course the mastermind must know was a lie.” **_What fools._**

Kiibo just nodded in agreement to her words. “That’s true. I guessed something was wrong with the motive so we decided to wait up what would happen to the others and then think of a solution.” Shuichi froze upon those words. “So you never were influenced by your memory at all.” He couldn’t stop the thought that he wanted to be in her place. **_How sweet._**

Their conversation abruptly stopped, since the black crack was now directly in front of them. Only one step from being free they haltered. It was irritating. Inside the dome the light had began to fade to twilight, but seeing that their exit was just an impenetrable black hole left a weird feeling. Attending to Miu and Kiibo the crack had been the whole time like this. “It doesn’t even look like an exit at all,” Maki said.

“There’s only one way to find out!” Kokichi answered and vanished in the darkness. Not waiting any longer Miu and Kiibo followed the short leader into the unknown. Shuichi waited until Maki and Gonta also walked through, making sure no enemy was in sight before following as the last one.

A lot of thoughts raced through his mind when he went into the darkness, coming up with all the possibilities that could await him on the other side. He thought of the lies the flashlights had told them. If they were somehow true would they just die after stepping out? Sure enough everyone was so blinded by finally getting away from their prison that no one considered possible dangers waiting for them on the other side.

His thoughts went further to what Kokichi had told them making it unlikely that any of the flashlight stories were true after all. Leaving it the most possible that they would just end up somewhere deeply hidden. Maybe a lonely placed where the government couldn’t find them? Maybe under the surface or on a lonely island? _So we will live, will we? **Sadly.**_

There were so many questions in his head about what lies ahead of them. Most of the questions would be answered only seconds from now. Still nothing would truly matter, what mattered was getting free of their prison and the horribleness of the past. 


	14. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Words he had heard before came to Kokichi’s mind and formed an idea how he could solve the situation in an acceptable way. “Hey,” he stated more energetic and cheerful than intended. “Let’s make a deal, Saihara-chan!”
> 
> The detective looked at him curios, the question clearly written in his eyes. Kokichi just showed him a big smile in response. “I promise to stick around with you peasants buuut only if you do the same!” Shuichi just continued staring at the boy in front of him before his small voice finally formed words: “...Deal.”

It turned out the earth was still pretty much intact and not destroyed in its entity by meteorites. At least after climbing through the domes wall his feet found themselves back on a solid ground. Also opposite to what had happened when opening the door at the end of the death road of despair he could breathe perfectly fine.

This had been his biggest worry but he already figured that the door had been one of the mastermind’s lies leaving him therefore only slightly concerned. Like, he knew what he expected to find when entering reality again but before not having complete proof a slight sparkle of doubt would always stick with him. Luckily no obvious menace awaited them outside. Everything seemed fine.

He took some steps away from the crack walking further in more darkness to give the others space. _Why is it still so dark?_

When all six of them had squeezed their bodies through the crack, standing somewhere next to him in the dark, he started to tap around with his feet to get a better impression of his environment. There happened to be definitely something cold underneath his foot. Maybe a stone path? He could feel grooves too and something more fluffy, maybe moss?

After another minute his eyes finally adjusted to his environment, noticeable through the blackness turning into dark shades. Nothing he could really determine or make out clearly, but at least he saw _something_. For once the figures of the other students only there as black shadows in a grey environment but also a huge border right in front of him. _Another wall? Are we in another hallway... **outside the dome?** _

He walked to the shade of a barrier and ran his finger over it. His senses told him that it consisted of bricks, feeling also the grooves in between the stones too his fingers got sometimes stuck at plants that grow there.

A sudden change in light and the appearance of a yellow bubble above them raised a strange feeling inside him. Like looking at a miracle every face turned towards it with awe in their eyes. Every face showed how much they longed for the real one and not the one fixated on the domes top.   _The moon._ _Are we really outside now? **Free?**_

It seemed to be a cloudy night because no stars were visible alongside the moon. Still he didn’t want to complain since the new light was bright enough to reveal what he had already guessed.

They were standing in a wide place with a paved ground, which obviously surrounded the whole dome. Their large prison standing out dark against the night sky, while a stupid brick wall kept them from completely being free.

They started rounding the dome until finally an opening in the wall appeared in front of them, making it possible to walk out into a dense forest. After passing the walls gate the moonlight vanished again behind dark clouds. But this wasn’t a hindrance at all for them, because none of the students were in the mood to let their escape being stopped by such a stupid issue like the lack of light. Therefore with aid of their monopad's (at least they were somehow useful) they made their way over bumpy grounds, fired by the thought to be free.

_The outside world...finally free..._ Those words sounded strange in his head. He was agitated to finally find the truth about what truly happened after having his memories erased and replaced with the masterminds stuff. He couldn’t hide the fact, at least not from himself, that he was pretty nervous about it. _What if the good things I remember were just a lie too? What if nothing of it was real...? What if I’m just a lie made up by some cruel fanatic...? **All of it just a lie...**_ He shivered a bit when hearing those statement coming from him, while in the same time not. _Doesn’t that prove that I’ve no idea who I am?_  

It felt strange to admit that he had no idea which memories and thoughts to trust. Alone the idea that the events so clearly present in his head were most likely a lie made him sick. He hated the mastermind and whoever helped her for what she did to them. Still it was too late now to change anything of the past, the damage already done, left them nothing else than to move forward and face whatever truth awaited them. A skill he didn’t possess.

When the moonlight came back again he looked over to the detective. Said boy seemed to be deep in thought too, paying no real mind to where he was going and nearly falling more than once due to it. His leg still seemed to hurt why he limped slightly. A fact that didn’t help in keeping his balance.

He got nearer to him until they were going side by side. “You’re over-thinking,” Kokichi told him in a serious tone.

He had to admit it is strange how he never really felt afraid of the other boy. Even during his memory phase he was able to endure the others strange habits. Stupid how this other Kokichi was afraid of nearly everything but didn’t shy away from a sadistic and crazy detective. Like they...already knew each other and got along? _I’m thinking stupid things. I should stop..._

_But accusing Shuichi of over-thinking when I’m worse,_ he mocked himself.

“It’s cold,” he heard Miu’s complaining voice from behind. No one reacted to it. They couldn’t go faster than their actual pace, since Maki, Gonta and Shuichi wouldn’t be able to keep up with them otherwise. Secretly he admired Maki for her strength, seeing her still not completely closed wounds. Despite the pain she must feel she didn’t whine nor restrained the group.

Her words from earlier went through his head, Kaito’s death must’ve affected her bad. _She talked about ending her life... I should keep a close eye on her from now on. And judging from Shuichi’s look when Maki shared her thoughts with them he will help me with this but...he’s not in a good shape either. His memory self is still pretty exhausting for him._

For quite some time they just walked next to each other in silence. The night closing around them, they passed abandoned places with no sign of civilization nearby. The mastermind had chosen this place well. The forest and the stone wall were shielding their prison perfectly from human civilization. He shot a short look back. All he could see was a small tip of a hill over the sea of trees. Was this the dome? He couldn’t tell in the dark but maybe the dome just looked like a small mountain or hill? He would get his answer the moment the sun finally rose.

Finally, _finally_ a small orange belt could be seen at the horizon. But it took the sun too rose a lot higher for the forest to finally get lighter and just like the image of an oasis in a desert, some way ahead, a village could be seen. The first spot of civilization after their escape.

For quite some time now he really had began to think that there may be nothing to return to anymore just like Monokuma had told them. So seeing finally a sign of civilization gave the exhausted group new hope. Even Kokichi couldn’t stop the relief welling up inside him.

Their goal within their reach and after hours of walking the group decided they had put enough space between themselves and their prison to allow a short break. It seemed overdue especially for the injured. Even Shuichi had started to stumble more often and fell at least two times in the last half an hour on the hard ground.

Maki was the first to settle on the ground. She let out a sigh of relieve looking extremely tired. Slowly everyone else settled down next to her. Kokichi chose a place between Shuichi and Maki were he felt safest after all. A fact he would never admit out loud.

No one wanted to speak for the moment only enjoying some minutes of peace and rest. Last moments of silence before the truth would come crushing down on them, in which form whatsoever.

He hated it probably the most how unsure their past turned out to be. Left in the dark without any hint if their blurry and untrustworthy memories were at least in some points true or if they had been completely made up. _I could be a completely other person... I could... **be me.**_ A shiver ran through his body and he immediately blocked the thoughts and searched for something to distract him.   _...I’m still both and it’s vexing._

“It’s a weird feeling to being...free again and close to finding out what of our existence is true and what not,” Maki slowly broke the silence, speaking out loud what was also torturing Kokichi’s mind and probably everyone else's.

“True,” Shuichi said not looking at any of them and instead turning his gaze over to where the village was. “But I’m also afraid of the truth after the...memory disaster.” He tried to let it sound as calm and normal as he could muster but Kokichi could see the panic in his eyes, even when not looking directly into them. He knew Shuichi wasn’t able to put up with all of his thoughts so easy, especially the invading ones, unlike him. He had to admit he would doom his personal state bearable at the moment. The best he could do was trying to help Shuichi in his own way in getting slowly better. Without making his caring too obvious and showing too much of his _invading_ personality.

“I think for what it’s worth, even when we finally reach the civilization we should stick together...so we prevent facing what’s coming at us alone,” Kiibo stated. He would never admit it out loud but Kokichi totally agreed with Kiibo’s suggestion. After all he had the same thoughts to which everyone would hopefully agree. Interestingly Maki and Miu were the only ones looking somewhat uncomfortable at those words.

“You think so?” Miu asked, while looking over to where Kokichi and Shuichi were sitting. “Even with those two still infected with the shit that dumb bear pulled on us?”

“Friends not bad!” Every single one of them flinched upon hearing those words. Not so much because of the content, but the words being the first they heard out of the entomologist’s mouth since their flight. He seemed very passionate to stop them picking at each other, so how could they object his wish. “It’s Monokuma’s fault! Friends should not judge other friends because of that!”

“He’s right,” Maki said, her eyes fixated on the clouds up at the sky. “We don’t know what truth will await us,” she continued with a sigh, “So how can we allow us to judge them?” She paused looking uncomfortable back at the ground, her face showed that she was about to say something she wasn’t really certain about. “I think...Kiibo-kun is right. We should stick together for the time being.”

_We’re all in a shape when left alone with our thoughts **only darkness will come around**. **I’m not sure we could stand ourselves** and face the truth alone...so this will be for the best._

“Right...” Shuichi murmured, “...but it would be better for all of you if I wouldn’t join and instead stay away.”

“No!” Kokichi shouted, surprising not only himself but also drawing everyone’s attention towards him, which made him very uncomfortable. _Dammit! How could I let that slip out so freely?_

Interestingly it was Maki who saved him from the embarrassing attention. “We stick together,” she declared determined, even if she was one of the students unsure about the arrangement, “Every one of us. No backing out.” When she saw Shuichi open his mouth she shot at him: “No point in arguing Saihara-kun.” He closed his mouth again and gave her a small smile before turning his face away again.

The group enjoyed another few minutes in silence until Kiibo decided it was time to travel further. The last part of their way to freedom awaited them, while a long and painful one lay behind.

Maybe Kokichi could blame his next actions on his tiredness caused by the long way they had been going or the dizziness still lingering in his head after waking up having nearly died from poisoning or the irritation of having a living environment surrounding him again after being non-existent for weeks...but when the boy in front of him stood up from his spot on the grassy ground he approached him in a swift motion and slipped his pale hand in the slightly bigger one. _Why am I doing this? Stupid! Getting drunk on the freedom? I don’t need anyone, this is just pointless. **Together we will be** **safe... If we manage to find a way we can help each other balance us out. It feels so much better to not be a complete waste of space anymore.** I can find a way._

For one second Shuichi stiffened but then relaxed into the touch and returned the gesture in closing his fingers around the others hand, keeping him from backing out. He looked confused down at the supreme leader.

Nearly dying from embarrassment Kokichi stared past the other, while focusing on getting his next words out in a steady voice as well as maintain his composure. “You won’t be left alone, Saihara-chan, even if you think it would be for the best. I...we all promised to stick together and help you finding yourself again and accepting what’s happening to you.”

He had to award the detective for his strength, even if he seemed to not acknowledge it himself Kokichi had a hunch just how difficult it must be for the other one to act so normal around them. Taking Shuichi’s few hints about the influence of the memory self into account.

Shuichi slowly nodded also avoiding eye contact with the other boy. “Same goes for you,” he answered. “Especially because you seem to be more of your normal self again. I’m worried you will just run away at some point, not wanting to have more to do with us than you need.”

“But...” Shuichi’s voice trailed off after starting a new sentence, while squeezing the others hand slightly. “W-Why would you even want to stick around me after all the disgusting and gross tings I said and did to you? Can’t you see it would be for the best if I just vanished? You’re all better off without me...” _We need to **face this together...**_

To tell the truth with his nearly none existing talent to comfort other people, he was lost as to what to say to Shuichi to stop his dark thoughts. How could he think about helping someone else if he wasn’t even able to comfort himself? Or more important being able to accept himself.

Words he had heard before came to Kokichi’s mind and formed an idea how he could solve the situation in an acceptable way. “Hey,” he stated more energetic and cheerful than intended. “Let’s make a deal, Saihara-chan!”

The detective looked at him curios, the question clearly written in his eyes. Kokichi just showed him a big smile in response. “I promise to stick around with you peasants buuut only if you do the same!” Shuichi just continued staring at the boy in front of him before his small voice finally formed words: “...Deal.”

When everyone was finally up and ready to go, while walking towards the village both boys kept their hands intertwined. Going the last part of their journey together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that's really it; The end of the story.
> 
> I send all of you my love for your support throughout this! A lot of Kudos to you too! <3


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